VERY sick birds - One sacrificed today for lab testing *Update* page 2

[LilRalphieRoosmama]

I see you have ducks too. I have duck eggs hatching on 4/13. Even if my chickens recuperate, will I be exposing the ducklings to this same thing?

I'm having a really hard time with this. The info I read said that the ones that do make it will be carriers so I can't bring new chickens in. I know what I SHOULD do; I just don't want to because I love these birds. On the other hand, I have 12 of their chicks hatching this Sunday. They are on hold for sale but that can be changed if I should decide to keep them.

I've never been through this before so I guess what I'm asking is am I better off to cull my beloveds and start over or just see what happens and hope for the best? This is so hard.

 

[cyanne]

I'm not much of a duck expert, yet, I just recently added the 3 to my flock and have not had any issues yet to learn from. There are definitely some more experienced waterfowl owners on here that can guide you in the right direction, though.

As for the carrier thing, I can't tell you what is right or wrong, just what my own opinion and experience are. There are some pretty bad poultry diseases out there where it is absolutely necessary to cull all of your birds and clean the area, and if you have a necropsy done on your birds and your vet tells you it's one of these then by all means listen to their advice.

The more common respiratory stuff, like CRD for example, it's sort of your decision. In my case, I bought two black australorps at a BYC meetup and they turned out to have CRD. Luckily they were alot older than my own chicks so I kept them separated and did not pass it along. I ended up losing one, but was able to nurse the other one back to health with the methods I described in my previous posts. I, too read the thing about them being 'carriers' and wondered if I would need to cull this bird. I really did not want to, since all of my nursing had gotten me really attached to her.

After reading about how common CRD is and realizing that my birds would probably come into contact with it at some point no matter what, and also reading that exposure to carrier birds may even give some immunity to chicks, I decided to go ahead and mix the Aussie into the flock after she was well.

She has now been in my flock for almost a year and I have not had any cause to regret my decision to keep her. I have not had any widespread outbreaks in my flock and have only experienced occasional mild outbreaks of sniffles once or twice in individual birds.

 

[LilRalphieRoosmama]

Oh thank God. We just got them all separated and DD and I listened to their chests to determine which ones were put in the pen and which ones were allowed back in the coop. Out of all 11, we only separated three.

I'm leaving to go to DBF's soon and he's panicking that I'll transmit it to his. I am going to shower and thoroughly change my clothes and shoes before I set foot in his driveway. The vet said it was a mycoplasm and from what we've read, it is spread by droplets in the air and direct contamination so I think we'll be ok. Hoping, anyway but his chickens aren't friendly so there's no worries of me touching them or getting anywhere close. I even promised not to visit his ducklings

 

[cyanne]

If you shower and wear different clothes and shoes you should be fine. Another thing he can do to protect his flock is to put out a pan of bleach water for you to step in before going to his pens. This will disinfect your shoe bottoms from anything you might have picked up.

It's a good idea to follow these precautions when treating sick birds in your own home, too. Save the chores with the sick ones for last so you are not handling the sick birds before going out to feed or handle the others. If you do handle the sick birds, change your clothes and wash your hands and arms thoroughly before visiting the others. Think like you are a doctor and you are preparing to visit a new patient after finishing with another patient who has a contagious disease.

 

[LilRalphieRoosmama]

I will do that - thank you. I'll even bring my own bleach! Heading out now - thank you SO much. You have no idea how much you've helped me

 

[LilRalphieRoosmama]

Just wanted to update because this is very serious. Everyone made it through the night. We did separate the 3 sickest hens from the rest of the flock and they are in the dog pen while everyone else is in their coop (doctor's orders.) We are filling their waterers faithfully with fresh water and doxycycline antibiotic.

Yesterday the doctor asked us to bring the first hen that passes away in for a necropsy. The sickest hen was really struggling for breath this morning, so I called to find out how much a necropsy costs. Pleasantly surprised to find that they don't charge for it because it is a learning tool. He asked how the birds were this morning and when I told him about the one, he strongly suggested that we bring her in and have her put down so he could get the tests going. DD took her in and within an hour the doctor called me back with the results.

They found alot of mucous-y material in a lung cross-section, along with a very high white blood cell count (which is normal when fighting infection but this was higher than usual). The rest of her respiratory system was fine which he found odd. Her liver also was not right (can't remember exactly what terms he used) but that could be from the infection. He saved a sample in case we need to send it out for testing later.

He did request that we send the lung sample to the lab to be tested. Unfortunately they do charge for that but I said yes. At this point I need to save my birds.

On the plus side, he checked for all of the other possible cooties (of which I can't think of the names - I know he mentioned aspy-something or other) and found nothing. Also did fecal samples and no parasites.

He put a rush on the lab order so hopefully we'll hear tomorrow or Saturday.

Here are the symptoms that I've witnessed:

Very loud breathing - not "wheezing" - actually sounds like breathing through the vocal chords. Picture an accordian-type sound on a bad day (does anyone even know what that is besides me?!)

Sneezing, coughing, shaking the head to try to clear it out, bubbles/watery eye(s).

Still walking around eating and drinking ok, feathers not fluffed or lethargic.

Will keep you updated and hopefully my bad experience can help someone else. Most important thing I learned (the hard way): Do not feel bad and take in other birds!!! I brought this on myself by rescuing 3 other hens that had no homes. Now I know why they didn't.

 

[pips&peeps]

I think your results will come back as IB or MG.

 

[cyanne]

Are you giving antibiotics orally via their drinking water?

If so, keep in mind that it is difficult to make sure the sick birds are actually drinking enough of the water to get a full dose. When they don't feel well they tend to go off their food and water. It may work to help the rest of the flock if they are just coming down with it, but you would probably be better off using an injectable antibiotic on the sicker ones.

I have had great success treating respiratory bugs with Tylan 50, even when the bird was wheezing and rattling loudly and looked just awful.

Of course, if your birds are already on one antibiotic it is not good to mix them at this point, though you can always ask the vet what he thinks about trying the Tylan on the sickest of the birds. For a full-sized standard bird I gave .75cc twice a day for 5 to 7 days for the one I had that was really sick. For the ones that were just starting to come down with it I just did 1 cc once a day for 3 to 5 days.

 

[LilRalphieRoosmama]

What is "IB" or "MG"? He had said yesterday he felt it was a mycoplasm (I believe that's what he called it) and it was a bacterial infection.

Yes, we are giving them doxycycline antibiotic orally in their drinking water per the vet's dosage instructions. They are really drinking alot and going through the water quickly. DD is home making sure that they do not run out and she is offering some in a shot glass as a special "treat" to make sure they are all drinking. The only one who wouldn't was the one that we had put down and tested today. We didn't hear any of the others coughing this morning or if they did, it was nowhere near like yesterday.

I definitely will get some Tylan from TSC to have on hand - so thank you again for that info. We've never had to face this so we were obviously unprepared in the medicine department. At least we had the terramycin on hand and hopefully that worked a little until we got them on the other antibiotic. The dr did agree that it (terramycin) was useless because it would have taken 20 packs to achieve the desired treatment amount.

 

[luvarabhorses]

The doxycycline is readily available in pills or capsules so I am suprised he didn't just give you those to pop in the mouth. It's really hard to control the dosage in water. I had GREAT luck the last time I used doxy on a very sick chicken with no balance, wobbling, paralyzed, disoriented , no sneezing wheezing though, some sort of brain thing. She even went back to laying which and acts perfectly fine. I really thought she was a goner.