jessmeagan
Chirping
- Sep 25, 2016
- 34
- 11
- 74
This is my favorite girl and I’m at a complete loss & badly need your opinions or advice!!
She was part of a group that was given to us when we started keeping chickens...she survived the loss of her sisters due to illness/tragedy & trained the new girls how to live in the coop & freerange without leaving our yard.
She’s always been the plumpest girl in the group, is prolly around 8yrs old, and finally stopped laying this past year.
She’s has never had any issues other than arthritis due to age so she sleeps in the old brooder box thats close to the floor with a ramp.
About a month ago I noticed one side of her face was slightly swollen & she seemed tired/slower than normal.
Within a week her eye was completly swollen shut (with clear discharge) & a black scabby growth appeared along the beak below her cheek fold.
It’s slowly progressed from there to bubbling growths over the eye that’ve scabbed over in black + the black growth along her beak is building up underneath taking over the wattle on that side.
**NOTES**
-NO discharge from her nose, other eye, or diarrhea.
-NO bad or offending smell around the area or her mouth.
-Swollen side is warm to the touch & has been hard as a rock (until most recent treatment)
-There are NO lesions, cankers, or yellow cottage cheese inside her mouth to indicate pox?
-I didn’t find any other signs of infection; bumble foot, scaling, skin or feather abnormalities, ear inflammation, etc...
-Doesn’t seem to have any difficulty breathing
-No signs of abnormal behavior; eating, drinking, & wandering around during free range time like normal.
-Just prior to this we dewormed w/ DE in their food before this started.
-There WAS metal mesh hanging off the front window of the wooden brooder box she claimed as her sleeping spot after the younger girls outgrew it. I thought maybe she’d cut her eye on it somehow & this was an infection but no idea if that could cause something like this + go on for over a month??
**Treatments**
Everyday:
~Soak the eye & surrounding area with warm epson salt
~Flush w/ eye wash
~Apply an antibotic cream to the lower swollen sinus, cheek fold, & black growth under the beak
~Vet RX under her wing & around the head before bed.
1) Tylan 50 injections for 5 days. No noticable improvement
2) Corrid powder in the water + Bird Powder over food (to make sure they had some healthy gut organisms for any stress.)
3) I’ve been switching btwn Corrid & “Vitamins & Electrolytes Plus Pack” powder every 3 or so days when changing the water.
~Also feeding them lots of good foods, watermelons, eggs, etc to make sure she’s eating well in case I miss a change of appitite with how bad its gotten.
4) Latest & Most Hopeful Treatment!!:
Past 4 days: I’ve Applied Terramycin oitment to the area after epson salt soak & eyewash flush.....
Some POSSIBLE improvements over last few days (after ointment)?:
>Some of the black scabby areas come off when I do the epson soak.
>The black scabby area along her beak is coming off- I could potentially pull it off but noticed a small amount of blood on the cloth after pulling a bit so I left it alonfor now (circled in picture)
>I’m able to wipe under the upper eyelid & the eye seems to be discharging again.
>The sinus swelling is now slightly softened & squishy rather than solid. Its still warm to the touch & very red.
I’m in SHOCK that she’s still alive & acting normal dispite how horrible this has gotten...If she’s willing to fight this hard to live at her age I want to do anything & everything in my power to fix her.
I’m sure the eye is probably lost but desperately want to save her & we don’t have any vets that will take birds around here....Any advice or thoughts??
She was part of a group that was given to us when we started keeping chickens...she survived the loss of her sisters due to illness/tragedy & trained the new girls how to live in the coop & freerange without leaving our yard.
She’s always been the plumpest girl in the group, is prolly around 8yrs old, and finally stopped laying this past year.
She’s has never had any issues other than arthritis due to age so she sleeps in the old brooder box thats close to the floor with a ramp.
About a month ago I noticed one side of her face was slightly swollen & she seemed tired/slower than normal.
Within a week her eye was completly swollen shut (with clear discharge) & a black scabby growth appeared along the beak below her cheek fold.
It’s slowly progressed from there to bubbling growths over the eye that’ve scabbed over in black + the black growth along her beak is building up underneath taking over the wattle on that side.
**NOTES**
-NO discharge from her nose, other eye, or diarrhea.
-NO bad or offending smell around the area or her mouth.
-Swollen side is warm to the touch & has been hard as a rock (until most recent treatment)
-There are NO lesions, cankers, or yellow cottage cheese inside her mouth to indicate pox?
-I didn’t find any other signs of infection; bumble foot, scaling, skin or feather abnormalities, ear inflammation, etc...
-Doesn’t seem to have any difficulty breathing
-No signs of abnormal behavior; eating, drinking, & wandering around during free range time like normal.
-Just prior to this we dewormed w/ DE in their food before this started.
-There WAS metal mesh hanging off the front window of the wooden brooder box she claimed as her sleeping spot after the younger girls outgrew it. I thought maybe she’d cut her eye on it somehow & this was an infection but no idea if that could cause something like this + go on for over a month??
**Treatments**
Everyday:
~Soak the eye & surrounding area with warm epson salt
~Flush w/ eye wash
~Apply an antibotic cream to the lower swollen sinus, cheek fold, & black growth under the beak
~Vet RX under her wing & around the head before bed.
1) Tylan 50 injections for 5 days. No noticable improvement
2) Corrid powder in the water + Bird Powder over food (to make sure they had some healthy gut organisms for any stress.)
3) I’ve been switching btwn Corrid & “Vitamins & Electrolytes Plus Pack” powder every 3 or so days when changing the water.
~Also feeding them lots of good foods, watermelons, eggs, etc to make sure she’s eating well in case I miss a change of appitite with how bad its gotten.
4) Latest & Most Hopeful Treatment!!:
Past 4 days: I’ve Applied Terramycin oitment to the area after epson salt soak & eyewash flush.....
Some POSSIBLE improvements over last few days (after ointment)?:
>Some of the black scabby areas come off when I do the epson soak.
>The black scabby area along her beak is coming off- I could potentially pull it off but noticed a small amount of blood on the cloth after pulling a bit so I left it alonfor now (circled in picture)
>I’m able to wipe under the upper eyelid & the eye seems to be discharging again.
>The sinus swelling is now slightly softened & squishy rather than solid. Its still warm to the touch & very red.
I’m in SHOCK that she’s still alive & acting normal dispite how horrible this has gotten...If she’s willing to fight this hard to live at her age I want to do anything & everything in my power to fix her.
I’m sure the eye is probably lost but desperately want to save her & we don’t have any vets that will take birds around here....Any advice or thoughts??
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