Worm Identification please--poop pictures

[My1stChickens]

I never imagined that I'd be examining poop so closely-- but on another thread for my hen that seems to be molting and have sour crop, she's also got worms. I never noticed because I only wear my glasses at my desk....

So I'm attaching several poop pictures where I thought I might have seen something suspicious. Tagging @Eggcessive and @dawg53 in hopes they will be so kind as to look and tell me what kinds of worms they see. The gray powder the poop is on is PDZ powder, which I use on the counter under the roosts.

The very loose poop is the sick hen, the others are from healthy birds. Thank you in advance for any assistance in identifying whether I'm seeing worms or debris.
Image 9382, something in the lowest portion, just at the edge?
Image 9383, 9385, 9386- right in the middle? is that some sort of jointed worm? or a stick?
Image 9384, at 6pm?

 

[dawg53]

I never imagined that I'd be examining poop so closely-- but on another thread for my hen that seems to be molting and have sour crop, she's also got worms. I never noticed because I only wear my glasses at my desk....

So I'm attaching several poop pictures where I thought I might have seen something suspicious. Tagging @Eggcessive and @dawg53 in hopes they will be so kind as to look and tell me what kinds of worms they see. The gray powder the poop is on is PDZ powder, which I use on the counter under the roosts.

The very loose poop is the sick hen, the others are from healthy birds. Thank you in advance for any assistance in identifying whether I'm seeing worms or debris.
Image 9382, something in the lowest portion, just at the edge?
Image 9383, 9385, 9386- right in the middle? is that some sort of jointed worm? or a stick?
Image 9384, at 6pm?

I carefully examined EACH photo: I do not see any worms at all. The closest that resembles a worm is in photo #9385 top right corner. After blowing up the photo, it's not a worm, it is a thin white in color urate strand...nothing to worry about.
The tubular shaped feces in the middle is just that, feces shaped by the hens intestines which is normal, nothing to worry about.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

Most worms are microscopic, other than roundworms and tapes. Best way to know if you're dealing with worms, and what kind, is to take a sample to your local veterinarian and ask for a fecal float. They do not have to be an avian vet.

 

[My1stChickens]

I carefully examined EACH photo: I do not see any worms at all. The closest that resembles a worm is in photo #9385 top right corner. After blowing up the photo, it's not a worm, it is a thin white in color urate strand...nothing to worry about.
The tubular shaped feces in the middle is just that, feces shaped by the hens intestines which is normal, nothing to worry about.

Thank you so much @dawg53. I very much appreciate your taking the time to help me. And I must admit, I'm pretty happy to hear no worms!

If you have another minute, would you mind checking these two pictures? These were from the sick hen previous day and what got us started thinking we saw a roundworm--near the edge at about 5pm. Does that one look like a roundworm to you? If so, would you treat everyone or just this one hen?

 

[My1stChickens]

Most worms are microscopic, other than roundworms and tapes. Best way to know if you're dealing with worms, and what kind, is to take a sample to your local veterinarian and ask for a fecal float. They do not have to be an avian vet.

Thank you BigBlueHen, that sounds like a good idea. I do have good relationships with several equine and one small animal vet locally. Would I be correct to take samples from several hens rather than just one? I'm thinking this might be a stupid question but are the worms the same across species, so that a vet will what worms even though it's chicken poop?

 

[Eggcessive]

I do think that is a round worm at 5 o’clock in the 2 pictures in post 5. Dawg53 may want to chime in. Most vets should be able to do a fecal float on chicken poop. I would take some combined droppings in to be checked, or you can just go ahead and worm all of your birds with 10% SafeGuard Liquid Goat Wormer 0.23 ml per pound for 5 consecutive days. Or you can use albendazole or Valbazen 0.08 ml per pound once orally and repeat it in 10 days. Here is a link for the albendazole (generic Valbazen)
https://horseprerace.com/albendazole-oral-liquid-for-horses-cattle-sheep-500ml/

 

[My1stChickens]

Most vets should be able to do a fecal float on chicken poop. I would take some combined droppings in to be checked,

Thank you. I was just calling around to get prices-- and wow are they high! But it turns out Texas A&M has does this for $19 per sample plus 7.50 per group of samples. So my sample will cost 26.50 plus postage. (The local vets were $58-70.) I'm worming with Albendazole as soon as it gets here but now I'm curious.

I could never do chickens for a business. I keep 9.5 year old hens, I only have 5 in total, none of which are laying. This month's extra expenses include 8 oz bottle Elector PSP, 500 ML of Albendazole, a poultry sling so I can weigh them and do accurate dosing...

 

[Eggcessive]

You can stand them on a $12 kitchen scale to weigh them. To get a rough weight, you can hold one while you weigh yourself on bath scales and then subtract your weight. Yes albendazole is rather expensive since it has about 1000 doses of 0.5 ml. It lasts a couple of years, and it should be shaken well before drawing up a dose, since it settles out. I shared my last bottle with a friend. I have used Gordons permethrin 10 concentrate at around $12 for a pint to mix with water 5 ml to each quart, instead of the more expensive Elector PSP. It can be good to know which worms your chickens might have, but the wormer will kill round, cecal, capillary/thread, and gapeworms if you don’t get a fecal float. I believe most vets want a fresh sample to look at under a microscope. I try to save money where I can.

 

[My1stChickens]

You can stand them on a $12 kitchen scale to weigh them. To get a rough weight, you can hold one while you weigh yourself on bath scales and then subtract your weight.

Yes, this sounds so logical. I have a fancy scale that also calculates BMI and other stuff. I carried it out to the hay barn, which adjoins to the coop. Dirt floor, level-- vs coop with shavings on the entire floor. But it would not even register at first, then finally said I weighed 57#. So I took the fancy scale to the horse barn, which has a concrete aisle. Got what appeared to be a reasonable weight for me, then went to get the first hen. Weighed again, holding her, and recorded the weight. All the weights came in lower than I would have thought, but I was trusting the process.... until at the end, I weighed just me again and it was .8 lb off from my starting weight just 20 minutes earlier. Two of the littles came in at less than 3# which did not seem right. But I think .8# margin of error is too much to feel good about calculating dosages for them. I already have a digital luggage scale so a friend is coming to help me get each one in a sling, and we'll hook the handles and get weights. I think the hard part will be getting their legs through the holes, all the reviews on Amazon said the hard part is getting them in the sling. But having an extra pair of hands will be VERY helpful. If anything goes wrong with this plan, the back up is my digital kitchen scale with a dish pan on top with one person watching the weight while the other steadies then barely releases any contact.

I'll have to report in once we get it done

 

[dawg53]

Most worms are microscopic, other than roundworms and tapes. Best way to know if you're dealing with worms, and what kind, is to take a sample to your local veterinarian and ask for a fecal float. They do not have to be an avian vet.

You can also see cecal worms and capillary worms in feces. You can see eyeworms in the eyes. You wont see gapeworms nor gizzard worms in feces.