toe and eye problems

[veggietreeigrl]

Hi everyone. I'm fairly new to BYC.

For those who did not see my introductory post I recently got a quail. The little I know of his background is that his previous owners got him from someone but didn't have enough space so they gave him to me. Apparently they already knew about his eyes problem and didn't mention it. He lived in cramped quarters with no bedding/litter and was fed only chicken food. Now, the people who had him last aren't bad people, they knew this wasn't good which is why they gave him up. I only mention it in case any of that might help with diagnosis. I have a million questions, but I'll try to keep it short.

First, his toe problem:


As you can see one of his toes is quite bent. I didn't give him a good look over the first few days because I wanted him to settle first and didn't want to stress him out too much. So, I don't know if this is an old or new injury. I'll have to ask the people I got him from if they had noticed it. Any ideas what this could be? Injury or nutritional problem or...? He seems to get around just fine. He's pretty active.


The other problem is his eyes. This isn't a very good picture but;


One eye looks completely closed shut, He came to me like that. The other eye (not pictured)started closing and looked watery a couple days ago. No watery beak or sneezing anything like that. Droppings look healthy. He's eating tons, drinking water, singing in the morning, active. I started putting terramycin ointment on both eyes and the one not pictured opened up and stopped being watery but it still looks cloudy. Any ideas to what's wrong? Should I keep using the terramycin? Something else? Try to find a qualified vet?


Non heath questions: How can I tell "his" gender? How can I tell his age? Is he a coturnix quail?
Thanks, sorry that was a lot of questions.

 

[veggietreeigrl]

Oh, also: I currently have him in an 8sq ft rabbit cage on newspaper that gets changed 2x daily. He's eating gamebird crumbles that I sprinkle with a tiny amount of spirulina (Cuz I'm a hippie like that.)

 

[dc3085]

Crooked toes are due to either incubator temp or humidity fluctuations during incubatoin or a genetic defect. If he can eat drink and walk it is no concern. It would be better if you avoided breeding him so he doesn't pass those on if it is a genetic flaw.

Without being able to see the eye more directly it sounds like an eye infection. Sometimes the terramycin works very slowly so unless you are taking him to a vet I would continue with it. Sometimes if you don't catch eye infections soon enough they will ruin an eye so that may be the case with the eye that was closed before you began treating him. Not to sound callous but should you decide to take it to the vet I would find out what the vet visit would cost before you take him in. I know I've always lived around livestock and I view them different than many people do, but at the end of the day that's a $3 bird so I wouldn't break the bank on him.

That is a coturnix and I believe its a roo from what I can see of his breast coloring. Pharaoh coturnix hens will have black speckles scattered across their breasts. Roosters will have a rusty reddish colored breast lacking any black speckles.

 

[veggietreeigrl]

I probably wouldn't have bred him, but that is good to know. Do you think there is anything I can do for his toe? Splint it or anything? It's definitely not bothering him, so maybe it is best to just leave it.

Good information, thanks. Hopefully the terramycin will help. I was thinking maybe the other eye was probably ruined for good. Hopefully not, but as long as his other eye improves I guess it will be ok. Thanks again.

 

[dc3085]

Nothing else you could do for him so just stay the course. Toe and foot problems must be addressed immediately upon hatch before the bones harden, so at this point it is quite permanent. If he makes it through the eye infection (They usually do I've only lost one I can recall to an eye infection) he'll be fine. Don't worry about his toes they will not affect the course of his life. Good luck, I hope he makes it.