What's Wrong with My 12 Week Old Chick?

greenbeandreams

Songster
10 Years
Aug 29, 2009
103
0
109
San Francisco Peninsula
1) What type of bird , age and weight.
Easter Egger, 12 weeks old, 2 lbs (1/4 lb lighter than the other two chicks I got @ the same time as her - when they were a week old)

2) What is the behavior, exactly.
Acts normal, still eats a lot, but is now lowest on pecking order when she used to be our strongest chick. Thin and looks mangy/ruffled - mostly around the neck. Has dandruff.

3) How long has the bird been exhibiting symptoms?
2-3 weeks

4) Is there any bleeding, injury, broken bones or other sign of trauma.
No

5) What happened, if anything that you know of, that may have caused the situation.
N/A

6) What has the bird been eating and drinking, if at all.
Eats normally. Per advice on BYC, I've up'ed protein. Regularly has a scrambled egg or warm oatmeal for breakfast (with crumble mixed in). Occasional treats like BOSS, quartered pumpkin, leaf of chard, occasional scratch. Yogurt 1x a week or so. Medicated crumble. ACV in the water.

7) How does the poop look? Normal? Bloody? Runny? etc.
Normal (on the soft side) to runny when they eat a lot of the sand that we use to keep the run dry.

8) What has been the treatment you have administered so far?
Poly Vi Sol for 5 days (1 week ago)
Wazine (3 days ago) followed by threehorses' molasses flush (1 day ago)


9 ) What is your intent as far as treatment? For example, do you want to treat completely yourself, or do you need help in stabilizing the bird til you can get to a vet?
I'd prefer to treat myself but do have access to a vet. That said, I've already been to the vet for two of other girls twice in the past twice months. Once, nothing was wrong and I was just paranoid (is that the case now?) and the second time, one had a strange bump under her eyes that the vet attributed to some sort of sinus infection.

10) If you have a picture of the wound or condition, please post it. It may help.
N/A

11) Describe the housing/bedding in use
Outdoor coop and run since 9 weeks old. We're in Northern California and the weather is mild but have used a supplemental heat lamp at night. They have pine shaving bedding in the coop and use the deep litter method with DE sprinkled under bedding and also in run and on roost. We have sand mixed with dirt in the run to keep things dry. They free range for 1-3 hrs during the day in our small suburban yard. They are our first chickens and our city just began allowing chickens so there haven't been any on this property in a very very very long time.


** Other question: I've checked for lice and mites (around vent, under wings, neck, and leg areas) and see nothing. I've also looked around coop, under the roost. I've gone out there in the middle of the night with a flashlight to check the birds and seen nothing. Would I see them readily on the birds if there was an infestation?

Am I just being paranoid?
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Sounds stressed to me as well, but hard to say. May I ask why you did a molasses flush after worming? That is very hard on a chicken and will take some time to recoup from. Molasses flush is generally used as an emergency removal of all digestive materials in case of toxin ingestion.
 

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