Weird little bird

[beckschicks]

I have three narragansett turkeys (they were suppose to be bronzes but they are not). They are roughly 5 months old. At about 2months old one of them I dont know what sex for sure hurt its leg. This might have been our fault we had a ramp to their house and didnt have anything on the ramp so it may have slid down it and messed up its tendon. This is all hind sight of course. I was competely new to turkeys so I didnt know what to do if anything. After all the research I have done i would have handled it differently. This is one MESSED up little bird. My other two turkeys are huge and just flat out gorgeous. This thing has not grown at all. Its one leg is completely deformed and it has not molted. It eats just fine gets in and out of the house, talks, poops normal, and is not picked on in any way. It does get the bubbles under neath its wings which come and go. Also its waddle is all pushed over to the side so it looks like the joker. I have started it on Tylan 50 just because I had it and I went what can it hurt. I know its leg will never get better. It doesn't eat that much and we dont have a lot of birds so I dont mind feeding it. The turkeys have a big house and pen that is all theirs so it wont get picked on by the bullies of my yard (the guineas). my question is does anyone have any experience with this type of thing. Will it ever grow anymore? Hubby thinks it will not make it through the heat of summer. I am not really attached to it but still feel kinda bad there has been many many a day that we walk out there and go if it is not better tomorrow we cull it. come the next morning it is up and moving around and talking. Breast wise and leg muscle wise it is healthy meaning it does not feel scrawny at all. If someone thinks I might have done something wrong in the beginning please tell me I am learning at this and understand I probably contributed to this situation through my ignorance.

 

[KatyTheChickenLady]

I can't answer with experience about this in turkeys. However I have seen it (about once a year) in the many chickens that I raise. Inmy experience that way, it will go down eventually. We try to butcher before some thing important gives out, which invariably it will.

 

[gotta have my peeps!]

Quote:
As long as the bird does not seem to be in pain and can get out and about, you could keep it on. But in light of its deformities, Katy is probably right, butchering it before something goes very wrong is a good idea. (Perhaps it is smaller because it is a hen.)

 

[KatyTheChickenLady]

I have the poultry channel too!

 

[ivan3]

Do you have pics of the `bubbles' under the wings? A shot of the three turks together (for comparison)? No respiratory signs/symptoms (if not, stop using Tylan)? What feed have you been using (protein %)? Have you tried giving this turk any vitamins (like Polyvisol Enfamil without iron - three drops a day for a week)?

I'd probably keep it in a separate pen/coop, if I was going to attempt to keep it going/treat it (badly `stressed' bird is often the target of pathogens and then serves as vector to infect rest of flock). Gimpy leg, alone, isn't always reason to sharpen the ax.

You could have been doing everything perfectly - and still had one of the turks fly off the roof and auger head first into a tree (we all keep improving `risk reduction', but turks will be turks).