Silkie chick puking!

[KatieRoo]

Hello this my first post but I have 2 silkie roosters and a silkie hen all 4 months old. About a week and a half ago I noticed my silkie hen was puking up little bits I thought maybe she had just over eaten and wrote it off. Over the next few days I would see her do it again every once in a while if I paid attention very closely. I started to get concerned and took her to the vet. At the time i took her to the vet her crop was mostly empty so the vet does not believe its sour crop. Vet wants to do blood work and xrays. Chicks were on antibiotics because of sneezing about 1 month previously. To me still seems like it could be sour crop. But now i just saw one of the Roos puke up a little too. Everyone has good energy and good appetites all of their crops arent large at all. I did put out a kefr milk with oatmeal yesterday for them to see if that would help at all. Only other thing i can think of is the roo and the hen who have puked now do have two different colored eyes and hen has scissor beak. Genetically the two seem like a little bit of a mess. But like I said they have good energy and appetites so im kind of at a loss. : (

 

[azygous]

Occasionally a chicken will regurgitate a bit of fluid from the crop and it's not worrisome. It bears watching, though. I would check these crops each morning for a few days before they eat or drink. If there's a crop issue involved, the crops will indicate it when checked in the morning.

The different colored eyes is very concerning, though. Do you mean different colored eyes on the same chicken? If you meant one chicken has different colored eyes than another chicken, this is meaningless. Different eye color on the same chicken is cause to suspect Marek's.

 

[KatieRoo]

Thank you so much for replying so quickly ! I've been checking her crop in the morning before access to food ( she does have water though ) and there seems to be a very small amount of something in there. Mareks has been a concern. The two chicks have one eye that has some spots of dark brown on top of their normal yellow eye color. I'm glad to hear some regurgitation is normal though I was hoping it might be but everything I read kept saying the opposite.

 

[azygous]

Can you post photos of the eyes? Comparison shots of both eyes.

A crop that isn't draining properly due to its low hanging position will likely produce this sort of regurgitation. You do need to watch it to see if it progresses. Right now, a small bit of material in the crop in the morning may be due to water floating grit in the crop and that's not a concern.

 

[KatieRoo]

Sorry this was a very difficult picture to get hair cut and all lol. So this is the worse of the two at first i thought their pupils were blown but after closer inspection it looks like a darker pigmentation. The other one just has a dot of it above his pupil about the size of a pin.

 

[azygous]

From what I can see, those eyes don't look like Marek's ocular phase.

 

[KatieRoo]

I thought it looked a bit off too. I couldn't really find anything else that would explain it though. This is only my second time with baby chicks/chickens and these ones are just such an odd bunch. I really do appreciate all of the assurance and advice though. I lost one at the beginning I think it was failure to thrive and I just don't want anything to happen to these little guys too.

 

[KatieRoo]

just as a side note she does seem to be puking several times a day and there are times that she is puking up a good amount of undigested food. I don't know if that changes anything. She seems to do better when I sit her next to me so she doesn't have to be up with her brothers but if I put her alone she starts crying immediately and gets fairly upset.

 

[azygous]

Is she regurgitating when she's left alone or does she only do it when she's being handled? I apologize of you've addressed this.

I'm at a loss as to why a chick would be doing this. My only idea is to change what you're feeding her to see if the feed has anything to do with this issue. If you have tofu, that's a very easy to digest nutritious food, and chickens seem to like it. If you don't have any on hand, put it on your shopping list and feed her soft boiled egg.

That's it. Only egg or/and tofu for a few days and see if the up-chucking stops.

 

[KatieRoo]

She does it when she is left alone mostly. I'll go in to check on her and because I know she's been having issues I'll sit and watch her for a bit and usually once she pukes I'll go to pick her up and separate her from her brothers so she can get some rest and we end up sitting on the couch for a few hours until she's had a chance to calm down and get some sleep then I'll put her back and repeat the process if necessary. it's been pretty consistent over the past week. I tried changing the feed yesterday to a probiotic yogurt and some oats and chia seed. I thought it helped but when I went in earlier she threw up a whole mess of it. I can definitely try the egg or tofu though I just wanted to throw the probiotic in just in case it was sour crop. The vet I'm going to wants to put her on a anti-inflammatory and a antibiotic but she was on an antibiotic about a month ago and I feel like if it is sour crop we should put her on an anti fungal possibly. I dunno, I feel like I should do something though.