Total Newbie Needs Help- Sick Chick?

[InLuvWLife]

Helloooooo! I am brand spankin' new to your forum and excited to be here. I just got 12 hens- they are about 11 weeks old, a mix of breeds. When I got the chickie-gals home, I noticed that one was wheezing and sneezing a little. She is a Buff Leghorn, about 11 weeks old. She escaped the coop later that day and was out all night before i could catch her. When I did catch her, she was having trouble breathing- I can hear gurgling in her chest.

Well I'm new at this but smart enough to know THAT ISN'T GOOD. So I put her in a dog crate separate from the other gals. She is resting quietly now. Any suggestions as to what to do now? Vicks Vapo-rub and chicken soup? AAARRGG! How rude of me LOL!

 

[chickensioux]

Hello to you and welcome. I'm glad you isolated her. Is she still wheezing?
Is there any discharge from nasal, etc? If she does fine and eats and drinks and all symptoms stop I would keep her isolated for a few more days and them reintroduce her. If her symptoms continue you might need to start some treatment.

 

[InLuvWLife]

Hello chickensioux and thank you for the welcome. Yes, the little gal is still wheezing, sneezing, and has bubbles coming out of her nose. Also, her poo has a particularly unpleasant smell. She is eating, but not a huge amount.

If she does not get better, how do I treat her? Is this a cold, chicken style? These are my first chickens since I was a young teen in 4-H, which was a LOOOOONG time ago LOL!

Thank you for the reply- you are the only one who did!

 

[jenni2142]

Chickens don't get colds. Sound like respiratory infection and should be treated with antibiotics. Keep her separated and watch the others closely for symptoms. As it sounds like she is in bad shape I would use an injectible antibiotic. Maybe search for recommended antibiotics and dosages. Would need size of bird for dose.

 

[threehorses]

Hi there, and welcome to BYC! I'm sorry to hear about your sick chickens. Likely either the stress caused something to show up in them, or the stress of the move weakened them so that they caught something new.

Of course, the "best course of action" would be to take the ill hen into an avian certified vet and have them swab her throat and nostrils and do a culture and sensitivity to identify the exact bacteria (if there even is one), and what antibiotic exactly treats it. That's always my first recommendation. You may or may not be able to do it.

In either case, you'll want to take care of some basics with them and then we can discuss antibiotics. I would separate the sneezing one.

First, any time birds are sick or stressed, you'll want to give them a supportive boost of nutrition and general care to help them either avoid getting sick or get better faster while sick.

These girls should be getting starter-grower or grower food at this point in their lives until they're nearly 5 months old or until their combs start to fill out and redden. So you'll want to make sure that at least 90-95% of their diet is a complete feed crumble called "grower" or "starter-grower". The nutrients in that feed will not only help them heal, but are essential to the continued development of there bodies (particularly their reproductive tracts).

That's a basic rule. The other 10% can be conditioning foods, treats, grains. You'll hear about "scratch grains". Scratch is considered a treat, something (when used correctly) is thrown out in handfuls to encourage the birds to "scratch" around in the bedding and fluff it up and stay active. If you use grains, use that as a treat - use other more wholesome and higher protein grains as part of their 10%. (Whole oats, cracked corn, whole red wheat - not milo).

So make sure their basic nutrition is in place.

Second, particularly during stressful times, you want to make sure that the bacteria that line their guts are plentiful. Birds lose some of that population during stress, and you should replace the good living bacteria. Those bacteria literally feed your birds, help them absorb what the gizzard broke down for them, and they also keep bad bacteria and fungi more in control by literal competition for the 'real estate' that is the gut.

You can do this with plain yogurt, unflavored, as long as you're not using a medicine whose active ingredient ends with -mycin or -cycline. One teaspoon per bird is a good target dose - it doesn't have to be exact. You can up it to one tablespoon, I just wouldn't go under a teaspoon. Some birds love it straight, others you have to mix it in a few crumbles and some water and give it first thing in the morning when they're really hungry.

If your birds don't love it, or you're medicating, you should instead use either acidophilis capsules from the grocery store/pharmacy (vitamin section - usually bottom shelf), or a prepared live- bacteria probiotiic from the feedstore. Of the latter category, Probios brand dispersible powder is my favorite. The reason is that it only takes 1/4 a teaspoon per bird and that small amount is easily concealed in a tiny bit of readily eaten treat, or even on soaked bread. (You don't want to give any probiotics in water - but on food quickly eaten so that the bacteria are still alive when they hit the gut.)

Your birds will need this every other day for a week or so right now. But since there's a sick one, with nasal drainage, I'd give it daily. The eyes and nostrils drain into the digestive tract of birds through a cleft opening in the roof of their beak (the choanal opening). The fluid and possible bacteria upset the balance of the GOOD bacteria in the gut and can cause loose droppings, digestive illness, and dehyration from the excess fluid passed. So just give the probiotics daily any time you see any nasal or eye problems to help firm up the droppings.

Additionally, birds not suffering with coccidiosis (yours aren't), can benefit from extra protein and vitamins while healing. vitamin A is of particular importance to the healing and health of the eyes, mucus membranes, and respiratory system. It's unfortunately also the most commonly degraded vitamin from feeds because it's an oil vitamin and very sensitive to light.

For ill or stressed birds, it's agood practice to pick up a thing of Enfamil polyvisol vitamins from the drug store (the non-iron fortified formula - I get mine at Walmart) and give those to any ill birds or stressed birds directly in the side of the beak at 2-3 drops per teenaged to adult bird daily for a week, then taper off the following week if they're better.

The reason I recommend fed vitamins rather than the water packages is that there's a reason vitamins come in dark bottles: they degrade very quickly in light. I feel they also degrade very quickly in a waterer. What's left is a 'soup' that encourages bacterial growth with not as much vitamin impact as I'm paying for. Also, three important vitamins (A, D, and E) are oil vitamins and are shown to be more effectively absorbed if given with food, not with liquid. If I'm paying for it, I want it to work. I suspect others feel the same.

If you must use a water preparation, I'd recommend Aviacharge. You can buy it online and have it on hand. But I still feel Enfamil's product (with its other vitamins included) is a more sure thing.

If you must, you can put the 3 drops in a tiny bit of food that you know each bird will accept readily. Again - a piece of bread, a grape half, a bit of cornbread, a tiny bit of wetted crumbles. Take their food up late the night before, get out there first thing in the morning and they'll readily accept most anything you feed them. Mixing a boiled and mashed egg into that ration really encourages them to eat, and provides a little protein for healing. Feeding the 2 drops of vitamins in an unmashed egg yolk might get the sick bird to eat her vitamins readily.

Personally I would make sure each bird gets some as all birds are exposed. Boosting their immune systems and nutritional fuel might just help some exposed birds not yet showing symptoms to actually fight this without antibiotics and get over it sooner.

As for antibiotics - you don't want to use them indescriminately. You will soon learn to not necessarily trust the advice of The Feedstore Guy about antibiotics. Most will send you home with terramycin which, these days, is rarely effective and often doesn't effect the bacteria that your birds might have. Better antibiotic choices are Tylan and LS50, but they also should be used only when you know for sure that the bird will not recover without antibiotic help. Again, Tylan is best used injecctable, LS50 can be used in water but their "2g/gallon" dose isn't the same as their 3gram per gallon treatment dose - so if you under dose it, you will not see any effects.

On the droppings, that's most likely because of her bacteria being upset. That's where the yogurt helps. If you treat, I would first make sure to get a GOOD antibiotic and treat with that.

You can also use VetRx (not a medicine, but a great supportive tool) on their beaks, nares, and beneath their eyes, and on the choanal opening in the roof of their beak. It's very inexpensive for a small 2 ounce bottle. It lasts forever as it's concentrated. It will encourage air flow in the nares and the tear ducts, and bacteria HATE oxygen. It will also help your birds' breathing.

Of the antibiotics listed, I tend to want to suggest injectable Tylan. You can use the oral form - it still might work fine, and might be easier since you're new to chickens. I warn you - it's more expensive, but if you don't use the entire container it lasts a while and will be a good additive to your chicken med kit. You get what you pay for with Tylan - it's good stuff.

Sulmet is another one that I'd keep in the med kit. It's effective against some respiratory illnesses as well as some digestive issues, like E. coli and the protazoal coccidiosis. You could try that med as well.

Another tool is your nose - smell the 'gunk' in your chicken's face. If there is a nasty smell to it, it might be Coryza. (That "fetid" smell is one distinguishing characteristic of the bacteria.) Sulmet is effective against it. If the smell is only mildly offensive, it's possible that it's Pastuerella against which Sulmet is also effective.

Bubbly eye can be M. gallisepticum or synoviea, both of which are susceptible to the stronger dosage of LS50 (lincomycin/spectinomycin). Tylan is also effective against both.

By the way, when you medicate, you want nothing else to be in their water - only the meds. You want to do that for no less than 5 days, usually 7 to 10 days. You don't want to miss one day nor should you end the treatment early lest you cause antibiotic resistance and lose the loss of that good medicine for your flock for the rest of its life, and possibly the next generations as well. It's THAT important! Poultry have way less antibiotics avaiable to them so we have to protect the effectiveness of what we do have left.

I apologize as this is a lot of information at once. Let me simplify it in a summary:

* Seperate the sneezer. Give her all the nutritional recommendations below. DO treat her with VetRx to clean her nostrils and under her eyes daily, and her mouth/throat.
* Give all your birds a dailiy nutritional booster of yogurt, wetted crumbles, possibly a boiled and mashed egg as their morning food.
* Give at least the ill bird vitamins daily - 2-3 drops Enfamil in the mouth
* If you medicate, get a good one like Tylan or LS50 and treat the ill bird only.

I hope this helps. Please feel free to ask questions here or via my email if anything I said was unclear.