Sneezing and coughing/rattling sound

[hunter1hall]

I have several 15 week old chicks sneezing and some have developed a cough/rattling sound. Its hard to describe the sound. They are all eating and drinking well and dont seem to be lethargic. However the sneezing has progressed to this new symptom. Their is no discernable discharge from the nostrils and there are no other apparant symptoms. I feed medicated chick starter to them. Any thoughts on what it might be and how I should treat? The affected birds are black copper marans and blue orpingtons.

 

[HippieChick2009]

Hi, I'm no expert, but had this last year when the weather got cooler. I used VetRX, just a couple drops in their nose and under their wings. It's sort of like Vicks for chickens. Chickens can catch a cold like us humans!

Also, I would consider putting them on antibiotics for 7-10 days. I usually give oxytetracycline in their drinking water. make sure it is the only water the sick chicks have access to. It could be CRD, so you should isolate the ones that have symptoms! Hope this helps! Best of luck!

 

[astatula]

Very weird to see this today. I have 3 BCM's and some Welsumers and Barnevelders, a few others, they are close to 18 weeks old. About two weeks ago I noticed one of my favorite BCM's with this gurgleing sound while she was breathing and sneezing now and then, and maybe a cough sometimes.

I watched the flock, 14 chickens, and saw a second BCM with some gurgleing, but the third BCM was not. I tried antibiotics in their feed for about 2 weeks now and I also put some soluble Tetracycline in their water for 5 days. It's two weeks now and one of my Blue Laced Red Wyandottes is sneezing this morning and some gurgleing sounds.

I think this is either a cold from all of the wet weather we had here in Florida for a few weeks, or it's something they are eating while they free range for an hour each day. These symptoms started just about a week after I started letting them leave their run for an hour or two daily, but I did change their food to layer feed non-medicated at about the same time.

They are still active and alert and really fine except for the snotty noises they make sometimes and it's been more than two weeks.

I think we are talking colds, but I would medicate your birds with some broad spectrum antibiotics (I think my bag of AB's said Duramycin for Chronic Respiratory Disease) for a couple weeks to rule out any lower respiratory tract infections.

Good Luck, my chickens are still fine 2+ weeks later so that's what you might see in two weeks.

 

[astatula]

Okay, I found an answer if your antibiotics at first do not work. Look up a product called Oxine, it's used as a fogger for the coop and the chickens. It can also be put in their drinking water and it inhibits growth of algae and bacteria. It is fogged in the coop and will kill all bacteria and the chickens inhale it too and it is 100% proven to kill respiratory infections as well as any parasites on your birds.

This is the best part........ it has ZERO negative effects on your chickens.

This is the worst part....... it's expensive

I have found the lowest price on the internet at....... PM me, I don't know if we are allowed to promote any vendors.

This info came from a breeder here in Florida with about 300 or 400 chickens, and she is an all-day chicken worker delivering 60 to 80 dozen eggs weekly to locals.

It's safe to eat the eggs while they are on this treatment.

 

[astatula]

Here is part of the selling page.



Using Oxine in the drinking water destroys all the biofilms, bacteria and other pathogens in the water that can cause Gastric Distress. Oxine is the ONLY disinfectant FULLY labeled for misting over live birds. Misting OXINE over your birds will kill Airborne Pathogens and put a Halt to the Spread of Disease.
OXINE is the only disinfectant USDA and EPA APPROVED for Human,Animal and Poultry Drinking water. OXINE, kills Bacteria, Viruses, Fungi and Spores with a Mechanical Oxidizing Action. Unlike other disinfectants, Pathogens can NOT become Resistant to OXINE and Pathogens that are resistant to other disinfectants succumb quickly and easily to OXINE. In tests conducted at the University of Oklahoma, Oxine was tested to be 200 times more powerful that Chlorine Bleach.It took 600 ppm of Chlorine Bleach to kill the deadly Bacteria E.coli 0157:H7 while it only took 3 ppm of OXINE to accomplish the same test results. Oxine is also used to control STICKY EYE in Ducks as well as Nasal Flushing of all Poultry. Complete DIRECTIONS are supplied with each bottle of OXINE


This stuff looks like it could work.

 

[kathyinmo]

I have read that Oxine is a great product, and many use it for cleaning and sanitizing the barn, etc. I do not believe that putting it in the water is a good thing. That will kill all the "good," bacteria as well. (Think of it as an extra strong Clorox bleach like product).

Unless you know what you are dealing with, the antibiotics could be worthless. First, let's try to figure out what this is.

How manybirds? What size coop? What kind of bedding? Do your birds free range? Have they been wormed? Can you look inside the mouth, and tell us what you see? Can you hear the gurgling in the throat or in the chest area?

By the way, what kind of medicated chick starter? It is probably medicated with Amprolium? Usually medicated chick starter contains Amprol and is in a small dosage to ward off cocci in chicks.
That is good, it is not an antibiotic.

 

[astatula]

This is just some reference for those wanting to use Oxine from a guy with some experience. This is not my own info. but info. he relayed to me.

I first introduced Oxine as a medicinal treatment for upper respiratory fungal infections, as outlined in the first article I ever
wrote for the xxxxxxxxx. Oxine was certainly not anything new at that time, but it was new information to most of the fancy.
It had already been used for decades in both the chlorination of municipal drinking water supplies, and was widely used
throughout the commercial poultry industry. But few fanciers knew anything about it. I happened to have a duck at the time
that was suffering so severely from a respiratory infection that I spoke to a Poultry Research Veterinarian friend of mine about
possible treatment experiments, since illnesses such as Aspergillosis were thought of as fatal if severe. He told me about
Oxine AH and how successful it had been when used as a nebulizing agent both in poultry and in the equine field. (Nebulizing
meant the bird had to breathe the product into its airways.)
I had nothing to lose since the duck could barely breathe, so I tried it. I used a Tri-Jet fogger and a solution of 6-1/2 ounces
of Oxine to a gallon of water as prescribed, and I ‘fogged’ the bird’s face and cage three times daily for ten days. She was
cured.
Since then, I have learned quite a bit about this product. Since Oxine is technically a disinfectant and I have over 26 years
in the specialty chemical industry, I understood the mechanics of how the product worked from the start. I also understand
EPA registrations, USDA, and FDA, so I had access to all of the many applications of the one parent product under various
label uses.
Oxine is known to kill every bacteria, virus, and mold it has ever been tested against and is 200 times more effective than
chlorine bleach. But one of the most impressive things about Oxine for me is that it does it with such relative safety (when
used according to label instructions). Environmentally speaking, Oxine actually biodegrades to ordinary table salt. And it is so
safe to use on livestock that it is actually approved for use in the drinking water of ‘organically grown’ animals. I use it myself at
the rate of 7-15 drops per gallon of water in our stock tank of drinking water for our own sheep. It keeps the water impressively
clear and algae free, while keeping down the biofilm ‘slime’ that tends to develop on the sides of the tank.
Oxine is used in many commercial operations in the automated drinking lines for poultry. It keeps the bacteria level down in
the water lines, prevents biofilm from developing, and keeps the birds healthier by keeping down the pathogen level that could
potentially travel form one bird to another. The side benefit for commercial growers is that Oxine makes the drinking water
more palatable to the birds and therefore they drink more. This is especially important in layers, but can have a benefit in any
operation since it also improves feed conversion.
Technically, Oxine Concentrate is a 2% chlorine dioxide gas suspended in an aqueous solution. It is diluted with water to
varying degrees depending on how you would like to use it. Since it is a disinfectant and not a drug, it must make direct
contact with the pathogen in order to kill it. In the diluted inactivated state, Oxine is perfectly safe to use around both your birds
and yourself. Oxine can also be ‘activated’ using citric acid crystals, which ‘release’ more of the available chlorine in the
solution, but I highly discourage this method of use within the fancy. If you were to activate the product, it is recommended that
you wear a NIOSH approved respirator and you would not be able to fog the solution into any area where the birds are
present. Without activation, I am very comfortable with using the product without a respirator or mask, although you should
follow whatever precautions you are most comfortable with.
Here’s how I use Oxine in my operation (this is simply an example program – you should adapt this to your particular
situation since every coop and hatchery is different). I raise both chickens and waterfowl (ducks). I use 1/8 tsp/gallon of water
for my ducks’ bath water to keep the bacteria level down and to help prevent bacterial enteritis, since E-Gads, we all know
what ducks do in their water besides drink from it. They get a separate small dish (that they won’t fit into) at night before bed
with drinking water that I can fortify with vitamins, minerals, and probiotics if I choose – but not with Oxine in it which could kill
the beneficial bacteria in the probiotic supplement.
I use 1/8 tsp/gallon of water in my chickens’ drinking water every other day to keep down the biofilm (slime) that forms on
the inside of the waterers. It also keeps the bacteria level down for when that amazingly accurate missile of a dropping
somehow makes it into the drinking water trough every day. (On the opposite days I like to include a combination vitamin,
mineral, and probiotic supplement in their water instead.)
Since I run a biosecurity program in my showbird coop, I use Oxine to fog the entire inside of the coop (including the birds
themselves) once a week. It keeps the dust down and knocks all of the viruses, bacteria, and mold spores out of the air. It also
keeps the air fresh smelling in there. Oxine also has a residual disinfecting quality so I try to moisten surfaces such as roosts
with the fog as I go. I see no need to remove feed or drinkers form the coop when I fog so the procedure is quite simple.
Other possible uses for the product are an egg dip prior to incubation (always using water warmer than the egg and at the
rate of 4 oz/gallon of water). In this case, you would simply dip the egg in the solution and lay it on a clean paper towel to air
dry – do not rub since that would breach the egg’s cuticle, something which is important to hatching success. You can also use
it at the rate of 7 drops/gallon of water in your water reservoir in your incubator, and/or in a humidifier that may be running in a
room where you store eggs prior to incubation.
Oxine has so many approvals for use in the (human) food industry that they’re too numerous to mention here, but it’s worth
noting since it reinforces Oxine’s overall relative safety.
You may purchase Oxine through several of the poultry supply houses. A few that I know of are Seven Oaks Game Farm,
Smith Poultry, First State Veterinary Supply, Cutler Pheasant Supply, and Aire Solutions, LC. All of the suppliers listed above
advertise in the xxxxxxxxx. There may be more and I apologize if I have left them out. If you are a supplier of Oxine and
were not mentioned here, then I suggest you advertise that you are in the next issue of the xxxxxxxxx so it becomes
known. Also, if you let me know who you are, I would be glad to include you in an amended copy of this article prior to putting
it up on my website next month.
If you need a fogger and cannot afford the more expensive ones, there is an alternative. It is the Preval Paint Sprayer from
www.dickblick.com. It’s a small hand held device that is commonly used when vaccinating poultry against viruses that the birds
need to breathe in to become inoculated. The Preval sprayer requires ‘power units’ to work and they can be purchased from
Dick Blick as well. Also, Fogmaster makes a ‘Fogmaster Jr.’, which you can view and purchase at www.fogmaster.com. The
suppliers of Oxine may also provide fogger options and perhaps some kind of package deal, so I would check that option out
as well