Vent Gleet or Something Else?

[Fn87]

This is my first time raising chicks; I work at a farm so we're raising around 300 which are about five weeks old now. Some of the chicks have this whitish clumping stuff on their butts. I'm not sure if it's diarrhea or something else or if it's related to feather wounds (we've had some issues with pecking and the wounds tend to crop up towards their butts too) or if it could be intestinal bacteria or vent gleet or something? What could it be? And besides the obvious cleaning of their butts in this situation, what should I be doing to treat the chicks and prevent anything from getting worse?

 

[MysteryChicken]

@Eggcessive

 

[Eggcessive]

Are those egg layers or meat chickens? They look big for egg layers, just from the picture. How much room in the coop they are in? How big is the run and do they get outside daily? What are you feeding them? Feather and vent pecking can be caused by overcrowding, not enough protein in the chicken feed, and boredom. Too much light, certain breeds, can also be possible causes. Are they all doing this or just a few?

I doubt that your chickens have vent gleet at 5 weeks old. Here is a good article to read:
https://poultry.extension.org/artic...ibalism-in-small-and-backyard-poultry-flocks/

 

[kerbotx]

Def looks yeasty/fungal - are they on the ground a lot, bedding too wet & dirty? Maybe others could chime in - I've heard of applying athlete's foot cream after washing, but haven't treated with this myself.

 

[Ebony Rose]

Certainly looks yeasty to me.

How warm is it in their living quarters? Yeast typically requires a warm, moist environment.

If a veterinarian is not an option (times are tough with Covid and lockdowns), you might consider deep cleaning their coop and inspecting it for moldy or moist bedding as a first line of investigation.
Secondly consider a warm butt bath, towel dry afterward and apply one of the following medications:
Clotrimazole (Lotrimin and Mycelex) or Miconazole (Monistat and Micatin).
These medicines are readily available in the women's health aisle at your local drug store, walmart, and the like. For human women, they're intended for vaginal yeast infections. The cloaca (vent) of chickens basically serves the same purpose and can fall prey to the same nasty organisms... fortunately, the same medicine works for them
Will keep you and your feathered family in my prayers.

 

[Fn87]

They are egg layers. Around 70 of them are leghorns, 25 are welsummers, 100 are isa browns, and 100 are various easter eggers. The leghorns are the ones with the pecking wounds because the they grew the fastest so their feathers started coming and others picked on them. The photo is of a leghorn. We have been startled by the growth rate of the leghorns because the easter eggers, isa browns, and welsummers are all still much smaller despite the leghorns arriving on the same day as the isas and the welsummers. They're also much fatter than the adult leghorns we have so it is a bit confusing.

We have been letting them outside daily for about a week now. They're only five weeks old so they're still sleeping in a brooder. I don’t know the exact dimensions off the top of my head but I would estimate that the brooder is around 50 or 60 square feet and their run is around 80 or 90 square feet.

We're feeding them Purina start & grow which is 18% protein. I posted another thread asking about the pecking and have since added more toys and some cabbage for them to play with/eat. The brooder has red bulbs and ceramic bulbs in order to prevent stress from constant light.

For the moment I think we're getting the pecking sorted. My biggest concern is the weird white butt paste that a few of them have. They're too old for pasty butt and I'm not sure what this is or if I should be taking measures to prevent it somehow or to treat it or something.

 

[Fn87]

Def looks yeasty/fungal - are they on the ground a lot, bedding too wet & dirty? Maybe others could chime in - I've heard of applying athlete's foot cream after washing, but haven't treated with this myself.

They're sleeping on pine shavings. We add more shavings on top I think around once every week and a half or so?

 

[Fn87]

Certainly looks yeasty to me.

How warm is it in their living quarters? Yeast typically requires a warm, moist environment.

If a veterinarian is not an option (times are tough with Covid and lockdowns), you might consider deep cleaning their coop and inspecting it for moldy or moist bedding as a first line of investigation.
Secondly consider a warm butt bath, towel dry afterward and apply one of the following medications:
Clotrimazole (Lotrimin and Mycelex) or Miconazole (Monistat and Micatin).
These medicines are readily available in the women's health aisle at your local drug store, walmart, and the like. For human women, they're intended for vaginal yeast infections. The cloaca (vent) of chickens basically serves the same purpose and can fall prey to the same nasty organisms... fortunately, the same medicine works for them
Will keep you and your feathered family in my prayers.

We've been keeping the brooder in the range of 70 to 75º but the humidity has been slowly rising over the past few weeks. It's currently at 53% but we had some issues with the brooder roof because we used straw for insulation on the roof but it started getting moldy so we had to change it out last week. We haven't been full on changing out the shavings, instead just piling more shavings on top so as to decrease the stress the chicks would experience with us cleaning out their brooder with them in it.
I'll get them cleaned off and send some photos soon if I could get some more advice on whether it is yeasty with a better photo of them cleaned off?

 

[casportpony]

I suggest treating for coccodiosis.

I'll get them cleaned off and send some photos soon if I could get some more advice on whether it is yeasty with a better photo of them cleaned off?

I doubt it's yeast.

 

[sourland]

Can you post a profile shot of the white bird ? In those pictures they look more like meat birds than leghorns. Leghorns should not grow larger/more rapidly than the other breeds mentioned.