TinkerChooks
In the Brooder
Hi folks, I haven't searched the forum yet becuase I'm in a minor panic but will do so once I get this posted.
We have two beautiful big healthy looking six month old home-raised Australorp hens that have JUST come into lay in the last week (and a bit). We have two small browns of about the same age, unknown exact breed but laying for a few weeks now, and one older brown maybe 5 years old. I wasn't expecting the Australorps to be doing eggs every day so I've been a bit unconcerned, but I've noticed that some days we are only getting three eggs, sometimes four, and twice now I've noticed shell-less eggs. They are getting good feed but I haven't boosted their calcium. They had a bit of a mite problem recently but I've treated the area with pyrethrum.
I noticed yesterday that one of the Australorps kinda sneezed and dribbled which I thought was weird, but saw nothing else unusual. Tonight I've just locked them up and noticed that one of them - presumably the same one - has a collection of symptoms I recognise. Dropped wings, slightly laboured breathing, slightly raspy breath. I've seen similar symptoms progress rapidly in a another girl about two years ago, and I'm in a bit of a panic.
I checked the vent on both australorps and they're very similar and normal looking, but the unwell girl is kinda clenching repeatedly when I lift her tail to look. They're both clean, though the unwell one does have some small white streaks in her feathers below the vent but that's all. She's also a bit unsteady and fell off the perch as I was trying to put her back on it. She's in a nesting box now as it seems safer! As far as my inexperienced hands can tell her abdomen around her vent feels normal, but I really don't know what I'm feeling for in terms of a possibly stuck egg. I was not pushing hard because I don't want to break anything that is stuck, though. Their crops feel identical.
Edit1: I moved her back up to the main perch because she obviously didn't want to stay in the nesting box and perched awkwardly on the edge of it. She did do a completley normal poo in the nesting box though.
Edit2: On the advice of a local emergency vet I've just brought her inside, separated from the others just in case there's a risk of it being transmissible. I found her on the ground, clearly having fallen off the perch, and had made her way into a loose milk crate that was lying on the ground, as a kind of hiding hole. She's not any more laboured with her breathing as far as I can tell.
Is coccidosis treatment a first line "just do it anyway" start?
Panic panic panic. We started with eight, six hatched, lost one, three were roosters, so now we're down to only two and they're absolutely amazing looking birds. We'd be devastated.
1) What type of bird , age and weight (does the chicken seem or feel lighter or thinner than the others.)
- Australorp, 6 months, not sure of weight but something like 3kg?
2) What is the behavior, exactly.
- Drooping wings, unstable on perch, mouth open, raspy breathing, noticed mucous yesterday and if I really think about it maybe her mouth was open a bit? Wings harder to tell because it's still cool at night and they just look fluffed up. They're the biggest birds we've had.
3) How long has the bird been exhibiting symptoms?
- My guess is probably about 48 hours at most. I'm not exactly sure when I first got any kind of sense of something being different. Put it down to other life pressures and inexperience.
4) Are other birds exhibiting the same symptoms?
- No, though one of the young brown girls could possibly be a bit off colour if I was being pessimistic?
5) Is there any bleeding, injury, broken bones or other sign of trauma.
- Nothing obvious, but there are two spots of blood on their perch that I just noticed. I can't see any plausible source, but they do all bicker quite a bit at the moment. It's likely just from a ferocious peck.
6) What happened, if anything that you know of, that may have caused the situation.
- nothing I can think of, other than a very minor mite infestation on their perch that I've treated with pyrethrum. I've checked for lice etc and they seem clear. Edit2: I've just remembered a dog we were looking after for a few days found a recently dead (say a week?) wild parrot in the garden about five days ago. She didn't eat any, just dragged the carcass out of a garden bed. I got most of it in the bin, but I may have missed some bits. Australia is currenty considered free of H5 and H7 strains of bird flu however.
7) What has the bird been eating and drinking, if at all.
- Normal pellet food. They also get rolled oats sparingly which they seem to love, they also love a little bit of dry cat food but we limit that, and they get vegetable scraps like lettuce and tomato. They were without water for a few hours yesterday afternoon before they roosted but I filled their tank as soon as I noticed. They've been out roaming the garden today all running around quite normally including the girl I'm concerned about.
8) How does the poop look? Normal? Bloody? Runny? etc.
- Normal as far as I can tell. - Edit1: yep, witnessed, normal.
9) What has been the treatment you have administered so far?
- Nothing, I've just run in to post this.
10 ) What is your intent as far as treatment? For example, do you want to treat completely yourself, or do you need help in stabilizing the bird til you can get to a vet?
- Ideally self treat. We're both experienced with human medical care and I understand a bit of chicken anatomy and the basics of worming and so on. As much as they are beautiful animals we've invested a lot of emotion and time into, $250 just to walk in the door of a vet, and more for medication, is prohibitive. We simply don't have that kind of spare cash. That's two full weeks of car fuel, two months of electricity bills, 10% of a month's rent
11) If you have a picture of the wound or condition, please post it. It may help.
- Too dark right now, and tbh there's not much beyond the symptoms I've described.
12) Describe the housing/bedding in use
- They sleep on an open perch, incredibly well armoured against predators, have three nesting boxes. I have a frame to add a coop to the side of the henhouse but it's not ready yet. The weather here is mild for chickens all year at night, daytime temps at the moment are around 18-25C, nights around 8-12C. Daytime they have access to a large garden. I used to have a problem with nighshades but I've pulled all of them out.
Edit: I just saw the 12 questions answered on a number of other posts. I've already written this in a narration but I'll add the 12 point wise at the end now.
Edit3: She just woke up inside the house in her box making the most godawful squalking like she'd had a chicken nightmare - and woke me up! Still panting a bit but not as bad. She has done quite a bit of poo in the box (on the towel) so all of that is still working :/ She tried to peck me while I was cleaning things up and straightening out the towel, so she's seeming a bit healthier I guess. Still sightly raspy lung sounds though.
We have two beautiful big healthy looking six month old home-raised Australorp hens that have JUST come into lay in the last week (and a bit). We have two small browns of about the same age, unknown exact breed but laying for a few weeks now, and one older brown maybe 5 years old. I wasn't expecting the Australorps to be doing eggs every day so I've been a bit unconcerned, but I've noticed that some days we are only getting three eggs, sometimes four, and twice now I've noticed shell-less eggs. They are getting good feed but I haven't boosted their calcium. They had a bit of a mite problem recently but I've treated the area with pyrethrum.
I noticed yesterday that one of the Australorps kinda sneezed and dribbled which I thought was weird, but saw nothing else unusual. Tonight I've just locked them up and noticed that one of them - presumably the same one - has a collection of symptoms I recognise. Dropped wings, slightly laboured breathing, slightly raspy breath. I've seen similar symptoms progress rapidly in a another girl about two years ago, and I'm in a bit of a panic.
I checked the vent on both australorps and they're very similar and normal looking, but the unwell girl is kinda clenching repeatedly when I lift her tail to look. They're both clean, though the unwell one does have some small white streaks in her feathers below the vent but that's all. She's also a bit unsteady and fell off the perch as I was trying to put her back on it. She's in a nesting box now as it seems safer! As far as my inexperienced hands can tell her abdomen around her vent feels normal, but I really don't know what I'm feeling for in terms of a possibly stuck egg. I was not pushing hard because I don't want to break anything that is stuck, though. Their crops feel identical.
Edit1: I moved her back up to the main perch because she obviously didn't want to stay in the nesting box and perched awkwardly on the edge of it. She did do a completley normal poo in the nesting box though.
Edit2: On the advice of a local emergency vet I've just brought her inside, separated from the others just in case there's a risk of it being transmissible. I found her on the ground, clearly having fallen off the perch, and had made her way into a loose milk crate that was lying on the ground, as a kind of hiding hole. She's not any more laboured with her breathing as far as I can tell.
Is coccidosis treatment a first line "just do it anyway" start?
Panic panic panic. We started with eight, six hatched, lost one, three were roosters, so now we're down to only two and they're absolutely amazing looking birds. We'd be devastated.
1) What type of bird , age and weight (does the chicken seem or feel lighter or thinner than the others.)
- Australorp, 6 months, not sure of weight but something like 3kg?
2) What is the behavior, exactly.
- Drooping wings, unstable on perch, mouth open, raspy breathing, noticed mucous yesterday and if I really think about it maybe her mouth was open a bit? Wings harder to tell because it's still cool at night and they just look fluffed up. They're the biggest birds we've had.
3) How long has the bird been exhibiting symptoms?
- My guess is probably about 48 hours at most. I'm not exactly sure when I first got any kind of sense of something being different. Put it down to other life pressures and inexperience.
4) Are other birds exhibiting the same symptoms?
- No, though one of the young brown girls could possibly be a bit off colour if I was being pessimistic?
5) Is there any bleeding, injury, broken bones or other sign of trauma.
- Nothing obvious, but there are two spots of blood on their perch that I just noticed. I can't see any plausible source, but they do all bicker quite a bit at the moment. It's likely just from a ferocious peck.
6) What happened, if anything that you know of, that may have caused the situation.
- nothing I can think of, other than a very minor mite infestation on their perch that I've treated with pyrethrum. I've checked for lice etc and they seem clear. Edit2: I've just remembered a dog we were looking after for a few days found a recently dead (say a week?) wild parrot in the garden about five days ago. She didn't eat any, just dragged the carcass out of a garden bed. I got most of it in the bin, but I may have missed some bits. Australia is currenty considered free of H5 and H7 strains of bird flu however.
7) What has the bird been eating and drinking, if at all.
- Normal pellet food. They also get rolled oats sparingly which they seem to love, they also love a little bit of dry cat food but we limit that, and they get vegetable scraps like lettuce and tomato. They were without water for a few hours yesterday afternoon before they roosted but I filled their tank as soon as I noticed. They've been out roaming the garden today all running around quite normally including the girl I'm concerned about.
8) How does the poop look? Normal? Bloody? Runny? etc.
- Normal as far as I can tell. - Edit1: yep, witnessed, normal.
9) What has been the treatment you have administered so far?
- Nothing, I've just run in to post this.
10 ) What is your intent as far as treatment? For example, do you want to treat completely yourself, or do you need help in stabilizing the bird til you can get to a vet?
- Ideally self treat. We're both experienced with human medical care and I understand a bit of chicken anatomy and the basics of worming and so on. As much as they are beautiful animals we've invested a lot of emotion and time into, $250 just to walk in the door of a vet, and more for medication, is prohibitive. We simply don't have that kind of spare cash. That's two full weeks of car fuel, two months of electricity bills, 10% of a month's rent
11) If you have a picture of the wound or condition, please post it. It may help.
- Too dark right now, and tbh there's not much beyond the symptoms I've described.
12) Describe the housing/bedding in use
- They sleep on an open perch, incredibly well armoured against predators, have three nesting boxes. I have a frame to add a coop to the side of the henhouse but it's not ready yet. The weather here is mild for chickens all year at night, daytime temps at the moment are around 18-25C, nights around 8-12C. Daytime they have access to a large garden. I used to have a problem with nighshades but I've pulled all of them out.
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