What happened to my chicken's feet--and what can I do about it?

[dridgecluck]

My ameraucana chicken has these wounds on her feet. We have 4 other chickens, and they are all fine. What is it? What should we do?

 

[Granny Hatchet]

i dont know what it is but to be on the safe side wear gloves when handling her and look up bumble foot

 

[Eggcessive]

It looks to be some sort of injury to me--maybe from another chicken or from a sharp object. I would clean her feet and legs up with some antbacterial such as weak betadine or hibiclens, dry them, and then apply some antibiotic ointment such as neosporin. If her scales are starting to raise, I would apply vaseline to her legs once a week, and really rub it in--it looks like an early case of leg mites besides the wounds.

 

[Granny Hatchet]

It looks to be some sort of injury to me--maybe from another chicken or from a sharp object. I would clean her feet and legs up with some antbacterial such as weak betadine or hibiclens, dry them, and then apply some antibiotic ointment such as neosporin. If her scales are starting to raise, I would apply vaseline to her legs once a week, and really rub it in--it looks like an early case of leg mites besides the wounds.

hi eggcessive, could she do this to herself going after the mites?

 

[Eggcessive]

Good question. I haven't treated leg mites before, but I'm sure that could happen. It just looks like scrapes though to me.

 

[SilkiesForEver]

It doesn't look like bumble foot, more like an injury, possibly from getting caught in something. Could she have gotten stuck in a fence? Is the wound open at all?

 

[BantamLover21]

That definitely looks like injury, caused by any number of things. If her scales on her legs are raised, she could have scaly leg mite, and be pecking/scratching her legs raw due to the irritation. Coat the legs will oil or Vaseline to kill the mites; I'd also put some antibiotic ointment (with no caine/cain ingredients) on the wounds to prevent infection. If not scaly leg mites, she may have cut her legs on something sharp. I would look around the coop and surrounding area for exposed wire, sharp rocks, or wood that she could have come in contact with. The other thing that may have caused the wounds is if you have rats in the coop--the rats will often chew at the legs and feet, even chewing off toes/entire feet if they can.

 

[dridgecluck]

Thanks for all these helpful thoughts.
I would say rodents are out. Clean, small, new coop with no trace of rodents.
She might have gotten scraped on a bit of dangly chicken wire on the fence--I found some of that.
As for mites...These are young birds--not even one year old. I understand scaly leg mite usually affects older birds. Also, they're five of them and the others are healthy. And can scaly leg mite be picked up from wild birds? There are no other chickens around, and I can't see how they would have come in contact with mites.

 

[Eggcessive]

I'm not sure yours have mites from the pictures, it just looks suspicious. They can get them just about anywhere. It does affect older birds, but I have found them in a 1 year old before. They are much easier to treat in the early stages. Just google some pictures or look them up here on BYC because it is good to know what it looks like.

 

[Granny Hatchet]

mites are everywhere including wild birds. infecting young and old alike. if the scales are raising up on her feet then that is more than likely