Natanya
Songster
- Aug 2, 2017
- 60
- 55
- 107
I've had a four week old Easter Egger chick suffer tongue strangulation this week. She looked like she was having difficulty swallowing something for a minute or two, so I opened her beak up and to my horror her tongue was green and grey and just not right.
I knew immediately what had probably happened; I checked the base of her tongue and sure enough there was a couple strands of human hair wrapped several times around her tongue, cutting into her soft tissue. She must've picked it up when I let the chicks wander on the livingroom rug last week. We have hard floors so it's easy to keep debris like hair swept up, except on the rug. I knew letting them peck at the rug was risky because of the possibility of this exact issue, and I haven't let them play on the rug since that one day, but that was enough to let disaster happen.
I cut the offending hairs away by laying a scalpel flat against her tongue and working it under the fibers and cutting outwards, and I swabbed the inside of her mouth thoroughly with listerine. She didn't like it, I didn't like it, but I was incredibly relieved when the swabs started coming away with a little fresh blood and without grey-green gunk. That meant there was less rot and fresh, hopefully healthy, tissue ready to start the healing process. I shot her up with a dosage of the antibiotic oxytetracycline I found here: https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/21/522.1662a, and set her back in the brooder with her siblings, where I knew she would be most comfortable and could get some all important rest.
Since she's been slightly lethargic, but still eating, drinking, and playing with her siblings, which is a very good sign. I was so worried she'd stop eating and drinking, but thankfully I seem to have caught the issue before things got that bad.
During yesterday's daily mouth swabbing the top of her tongue started cracking and peeling away revealing what's left of the living portion of her tongue underneath. Getting as much of the dead tissue out that was ready to come out seemed really important, so I took up the scalpel again and scraped away as much of the rot as I could without causing too much bleeding. Her baby bird screaming was distressing. I didn't want to put her through so much pain, but leaving the rot in to possibly compromise what's left of the healthy tissue of her tongue seemed like a very bad idea if it could be safely removed.
Watching the baby suffer hurts my soul. I wish bad things didn't have to happen to babies. She's taking things in stride, though. Seeing how strong she's being despite the extreme adversity she's facing gives me strength to not fall into despair despite letting such a bad circumstance befall this little baby that's in my care. Gosh.
TL;DR, human hairs are one of the worst things for baby chickens and will cut their tongues off. No hairs for babies.
I knew immediately what had probably happened; I checked the base of her tongue and sure enough there was a couple strands of human hair wrapped several times around her tongue, cutting into her soft tissue. She must've picked it up when I let the chicks wander on the livingroom rug last week. We have hard floors so it's easy to keep debris like hair swept up, except on the rug. I knew letting them peck at the rug was risky because of the possibility of this exact issue, and I haven't let them play on the rug since that one day, but that was enough to let disaster happen.
I cut the offending hairs away by laying a scalpel flat against her tongue and working it under the fibers and cutting outwards, and I swabbed the inside of her mouth thoroughly with listerine. She didn't like it, I didn't like it, but I was incredibly relieved when the swabs started coming away with a little fresh blood and without grey-green gunk. That meant there was less rot and fresh, hopefully healthy, tissue ready to start the healing process. I shot her up with a dosage of the antibiotic oxytetracycline I found here: https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/21/522.1662a, and set her back in the brooder with her siblings, where I knew she would be most comfortable and could get some all important rest.
Since she's been slightly lethargic, but still eating, drinking, and playing with her siblings, which is a very good sign. I was so worried she'd stop eating and drinking, but thankfully I seem to have caught the issue before things got that bad.
During yesterday's daily mouth swabbing the top of her tongue started cracking and peeling away revealing what's left of the living portion of her tongue underneath. Getting as much of the dead tissue out that was ready to come out seemed really important, so I took up the scalpel again and scraped away as much of the rot as I could without causing too much bleeding. Her baby bird screaming was distressing. I didn't want to put her through so much pain, but leaving the rot in to possibly compromise what's left of the healthy tissue of her tongue seemed like a very bad idea if it could be safely removed.
Watching the baby suffer hurts my soul. I wish bad things didn't have to happen to babies. She's taking things in stride, though. Seeing how strong she's being despite the extreme adversity she's facing gives me strength to not fall into despair despite letting such a bad circumstance befall this little baby that's in my care. Gosh.
TL;DR, human hairs are one of the worst things for baby chickens and will cut their tongues off. No hairs for babies.
