The Old Folks Home

[Cynthia12]

Anyone else having problems uploading pictures today..give it a try for me..thanks...I hope it isn't my computer, or camera.

 

[superchemicalgirl]

Anyone else having problems uploading pictures today..give it a try for me..thanks...I hope it isn't my computer, or camera.

Whatever kinks there were with images appears to be worked out This is one of my chronic bumblefoot girls just a few minutes ago. She's so calm and will usually sit in her bath for 20 minutes as prescribed by her pharmacist with minimal supervision. Tonight there was a lot of "BIDDY! FOOT IN THE BATH!" because Chris bought her some red seedless grapes (her favorite) earlier this week and has been feeding them to her before the bath is over. Birds aren't stupid. She was all about telling me I wasn't doing it right tonight.

 

[Cynthia12]

Whatever kinks there were with images appears to be worked out This is one of my chronic bumblefoot girls just a few minutes ago. She's so calm and will usually sit in her bath for 20 minutes as prescribed by her pharmacist with minimal supervision. Tonight there was a lot of "BIDDY! FOOT IN THE BATH!" because Chris bought her some red seedless grapes (her favorite) earlier this week and has been feeding them to her before the bath is over. Birds aren't stupid. She was all about telling me I wasn't doing it right tonight.

Tooo cute! And yes, now I can post pictures! Is that a leghorn? I had one with bumble foot once. She was really good about it too. I love the leghorns..all of the ones I've had..one at a time through the years, have been very friendly, and they are little pigs! My girls now is named, Miss Piggy.

 

[Arielle]

SCG--what a hoot!!




How do I identify bumble foot and how do I treat it? I suspect I have a couple turkeys in need of a little help. You can PM me if desired.

 

[superchemicalgirl]

SCG--what a hoot!!




How do I identify bumble foot and how do I treat it? I suspect I have a couple turkeys in need of a little help. You can PM me if desired.

The thread seems to have died down a bit so I'll answer here. Bumblefoot is easy to spot. The pad of the foot swells up (and between the toes) and there's a visible black or dark brown scab on the underside. This one's not too bad... I've seen pads super swollen with a tiny little bumble on the bottom, and I've seen bumbles that are so big they're about a quarter size...



What we do is soak the foot daily in water with epsom salts and some soap to loosen the poo. I use chlorhexidine or something with triclosan/antibacterial for the soap, usually. Then after soaking wash the foot real good. We then wrap the biddy up if they're new/freaked out:



Then cut the bumble(s) out with a sanitized (with 70% alcohol allowed to dry) razor blade and tweezers. Sometimes you can squeeze pus out, sometimes you can't. Sometimes you'll get a little bit of blood, and that's ok, too. We then use hydrogen peroxide or normal saline irrigation, depending on how bad the bumble is, in the wound, cover the pad and pack the wound with triple antibiotic ointment (without aloe or pain relief!); place a small square of gauze with the ointment on the wound, and then give the biddy a boot with Coban tape (that only sticks to itself). There's plenty of tutorials out there on how to cut the Coban and wrap the foot, but it's 3 cuts up top and one on the bottom for the toes:



The wrap the foot and put a small piece around the ankle to hold it:



You do this daily. Normally the swelling goes down really well after the first treatment, sometimes not. It's at least a 2 week process to heal them. Some people start treating at the first sign of scab, I don't. I wait for the swelling to start. I also try to only have 1 (max of 2) biddies being treated at the same time. I also try and keep them in soft bottomed cages (not wire, or at least cover the wire) in my basement until a real regular scab forms or even longer so they aren't walking around and jumping on and off roosts with their hurt foot or getting a lot of poop/dirt or even gross water if it rains into the wound - it helps them heal faster.

Once the biddy gets used to the treatment it's really easy. Soaking them requires only light supervision; and I can bandage most of my biddies without major panic from them - the one last night is a champ - you just set her on her side on the counter and apply light weight to her side and she stays there while you bandage. Other biddies make it a 2 person job.

Also be aware that the biddies make it their goal during the treatment to poop on your floor, counter, down your body... so you want to put a towel down or hold a towel under their butt. Some birds act broodyish when you put them in a cage and they don't want to soil it so they hold a nice big broody explosive horrible diarrhea like poop which they release almost the second they go into the warm water soak. I've seen those things projectile a few feet, too, especially with the bigger birds. My RIR that we did recently was queen of getting it on the counter, down the dishwasher, onto the floor and onto the cabinets on the island across from the counter she was on. I was so glad when her foot healed.


Here's a Miss Piggy for you:

 

[Stumpy]

superchemicalgirl, thanks for such an in-depth explanation and tutorial. I can't imagine any of my chickens standing still in the bath. So far I haven't had this issue.

 

[Arielle]

SCG--thanks for the details AND THE PICTURES! All before you left for work in the morning too!

I will have another look at the feet, when DH can help me wrestle the 30# tom!, and look for a dark area. I have looked at the soles trying to figure out what I have, don't remember seeing any dark spots. But now I am a bit more a aware of what to look for, I'll look again.




On another note:
DH bought a number of boxed lettuces Sunday afternoon, like 8, and I'm thinking WTH? He better be the one eating those. I'll eat some but I can't eat 8! THen ERUEKA, told the boys that for every salad they eat =15 minutes of earned computer time!! 2 salads for youngest; 5 for the oldest!!!! AND they are already into the lettuces this morning!!

 

[Wisher1000]

Am I the only one who doesn't know what a "boxed lettuce" is? I mean, I imagine it is a box of lettuce, but I have never seen such. Where do you get them, are they WAY cheaper? How many heads in a box?

 

[Cynthia12]

The thread seems to have died down a bit so I'll answer here. Bumblefoot is easy to spot. The pad of the foot swells up (and between the toes) and there's a visible black or dark brown scab on the underside. This one's not too bad... I've seen pads super swollen with a tiny little bumble on the bottom, and I've seen bumbles that are so big they're about a quarter size...



What we do is soak the foot daily in water with epsom salts and some soap to loosen the poo. I use chlorhexidine or something with triclosan/antibacterial for the soap, usually. Then after soaking wash the foot real good. We then wrap the biddy up if they're new/freaked out:



Then cut the bumble(s) out with a sanitized (with 70% alcohol allowed to dry) razor blade and tweezers. Sometimes you can squeeze pus out, sometimes you can't. Sometimes you'll get a little bit of blood, and that's ok, too. We then use hydrogen peroxide or normal saline irrigation, depending on how bad the bumble is, in the wound, cover the pad and pack the wound with triple antibiotic ointment (without aloe or pain relief!); place a small square of gauze with the ointment on the wound, and then give the biddy a boot with Coban tape (that only sticks to itself). There's plenty of tutorials out there on how to cut the Coban and wrap the foot, but it's 3 cuts up top and one on the bottom for the toes:



The wrap the foot and put a small piece around the ankle to hold it:



You do this daily. Normally the swelling goes down really well after the first treatment, sometimes not. It's at least a 2 week process to heal them. Some people start treating at the first sign of scab, I don't. I wait for the swelling to start. I also try to only have 1 (max of 2) biddies being treated at the same time. I also try and keep them in soft bottomed cages (not wire, or at least cover the wire) in my basement until a real regular scab forms or even longer so they aren't walking around and jumping on and off roosts with their hurt foot or getting a lot of poop/dirt or even gross water if it rains into the wound - it helps them heal faster.

Once the biddy gets used to the treatment it's really easy. Soaking them requires only light supervision; and I can bandage most of my biddies without major panic from them - the one last night is a champ - you just set her on her side on the counter and apply light weight to her side and she stays there while you bandage. Other biddies make it a 2 person job.

Also be aware that the biddies make it their goal during the treatment to poop on your floor, counter, down your body... so you want to put a towel down or hold a towel under their butt. Some birds act broodyish when you put them in a cage and they don't want to soil it so they hold a nice big broody explosive horrible diarrhea like poop which they release almost the second they go into the warm water soak. I've seen those things projectile a few feet, too, especially with the bigger birds. My RIR that we did recently was queen of getting it on the counter, down the dishwasher, onto the floor and onto the cabinets on the island across from the counter she was on. I was so glad when her foot healed.


Here's a Miss Piggy for you:

I have a leghorn named Miss Piggy. Nice job on the bumble foot..and the explanation on how to do this. I had to work on one once. It does sound like an awful thing to use a razor, but that is how it's done, and for those who haven't had to do this, believe it or not, when the chicken is wrapped up, they don't jerk away. Once you get that plug out, you can almost see the ease of walking, even with them taped up!
I try so hard to have a lot of shavings where they jump off the roost, but the little stinks will kick it around, so I am always shoving it back to the middle where they jump down in the morning.

 

[Stumpy]

Am I the only one who doesn't know what a "boxed lettuce" is? I mean, I imagine it is a box of lettuce, but I have never seen such. Where do you get them, are they WAY cheaper? How many heads in a box?

Same here.