Sick Turkey

[BryanB]

I'm watching some friends chickens and turkey while they are away on vacation and the day they were leaving, he was showing me how to feed and water them. The turkey had a patch on its chest area that was very dirty, and looked as if he had been picking at it. He told me to take some peroxide which he had, water it down some and toss it on its chest area. I did that in the evening as I was putting them for the evening. The next morning while I was letting them out, it looked worse so I did it to it again, fed them and water and off to work. Last night when I was putting them back up, it diffently has been been bleeding, and some of the chickens were trying to peck on it. This morning, it looks like you can see the inside of the muscle on its lower chest. Its acting normal, as far as someone who knows nothing about them goes, its eating, drinking, walking around pecking like the chickens are and making noises. Everyonce in a while it bends its head down and picks at the area.

Any ideas ?

 

[kuntrygirl]

oh my! I have no idea. Have you notified the owners of what is going on with their turkey?

 

[Denninmi]

Yeah, you need to take care of that right away before it gets any worse. Something small like that can become life threatening quickly. Infection can set in, flies can lay eggs that will develop into maggots in the wound, all kinds of things.

If I were you, I would treat the wound first with peroxide, straight from the bottle (3.0% H2O2), and then use Blue Kote wound dressing (sold at feed stores and farm supply stores). If you can't find Blue Kote, go to your local drugstore and see what products they have for human wound dressing -- something like an antiseptic and a topical antibiotic would be good.

And, you should isolate the bird from the rest, since an open wound is a big invitation to picking, and you may need to put some kind of a cone or collar on the bird to keep it from picking its own wound, or at least try an anti-picking spray, sold in pet stores.

It sounds like a lot, but the life of the bird is quite possibly at stake. If nothing else, you should contact the owners and ask them what they would like you to do. If you feel the task is beyond you, see if they will spring for a vet to treat the bird.

 

[BryanB]

Thank You for the replies. I'll see if I can contact them. They are in Germany . . . .

 

[ivan3]

Nice of you to take an interest. Along with what has been mentioned (clean, dry bedding is most important) you might want to take a gander at the document linked to below:

http://www.hybridturkeys.com/Media/PDF_files/Health/Cellulitus.pdf