something wrong with my turkey!!

[fitz]

hi all, i have two toms and one female turkey (dunno the proper term for female turkey), and they were doing fine until a chickpox breakout a few weeks ago. Now most of them exhibit no signs of chickenpox symptoms but my female turkey is constantly drooling for some reason and has lost ALOT of weight... I tried to look into her throat to see if something is stuck but I can see nothing... But i can't look very far... when i give her veggie treats she can swallow the whole thing sometimes... she doesn't seem to be as interested in eating as before...

anyone knows what's wrong?

plz email to [email protected] if you wish. thx!

 

[Eggs4Sale]

I don't know what's wrong with your hen, but I do know you need to force food on her if she won't eat it herself.

Can you isolate her? Get her in a large cage?

Try this:

Hardboil a couple of eggs, remove the hard-boiled yolks.

Smash up the yolks in a measuring cup. Drop three drops of PolyViSol WITHOUT Iron onto the egg yolk. Add a spoonful of plain yogurt. Mix in a little lay crumble.

Mix it all up, and see how much she eats. If she won't eat on her own, you'll have to either force feed her or find ways to entice her. Put a yummy bug in her food. A few seeds. Just where she can see it but ends up pecking the other stuff, too.

She will not likely get better on her own if she's not eating much. And if she's sick, she won't have the strength to fight anything off without the energy from food.

 

[Duck Keeper]

I was reading a thread where someone's turkey had lost a lot of weight just yesterday, and it turned out to be a heavy mite/lice infestation.

Also check her poop for worms.







EDIT: I've heard female turkeys called both Jennies (Jenny) or a hen.

 

[fitz]

thanks for the suggestions, i will check her poop tomorrow for worms... and feed her something yummy... let's see if this solves the problem.

 

[fitz]

poop appears fine, but i noticed that it struggles to breathe... any ideas? She sounds like she has some mucous or something blocking her breathing... is it the damage from the previous chicken pox ? i'm worried...

 

[jenjscott]

pox can be "wet pox" which causes lesions in the respiratory tract. The prognosis for this is not real good. I suggest you read this thread:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=98333

 

[fitz]

hi all, i'm getting really worried now... apparently the same symptoms are spreading to my chickens now! (my turkey and chickens live together). I have noticed a drop in feeding and water, and one of the birds today started having watery eyes (there are bubbles in there!! And she was fine this morning, she started behaving unlike herself in the late afternoon). I have the antibiotic from before, don't remember the name but starts with the letter D.

What do you guys think my hen with the watery eyes have?? What can I do to help?? Her poop looked fine, but that was this morning.

 

[ivan3]

Fitz, please repost over in emergencies (give timeline, when chooks started developing symptoms, etc.) answer the relevant questions here: https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=3569 and start a new thread.

You'll get a lot more folks who'll see this and might be able to help.

Good luck!

 

[Donna R]

You can try giving her (putting it down her throat is necessary) a cold/flu capsule, like we humans take, 2 times a day. It will help with her congestion. If it is fowl pox, the wet kind, there isn't much you can do but wait. I agree with force feeding her to keep up her strength and try the cold capsules. It has seemed to help mine when they had trouble breathing. The cheap ones work as well as the expensive.