Hi everyone-
I need some advice. I have a nearly 10 year old chicken who was attacked by a racoon 2 months ago (all in the coop were injured or killed). At first she showed no outward injury- we thought she had been shoved off the roost in the panic of the other birds and it seemed the ankle was broken or badly sprained as she was favouring it heavily, hopping and the leg itself at the ankle was grossly swollen.
We splinted this and kept her indoors and the swelling began to go down. Once she got restless to go back out I put her out with the splint and took it off when she really wanted to walk without it. Seemed to be doing well.
A week later I saw her laying in the yard and inspecting our back camera it seemed she had been laying by herself in a corner. On inspection I found her belly completely bare of feathers and she was markedly thinner. I took her indoors and found that same foot was swollen grossly again and the bottom was completely black. When I spread the toes this time I found that the third toe was deeply split into the flesh so I assume this is where infection got in. Over the next day or so it turned green and pussed and so she was brought in and set up more permanently in our dog’s large crate with towels for padding.
We’d never had a bird with a bumble before and didn’t know what to do- a few days later the black area got so big and hard I ended up removing with a sterile blade. At this point my poor bird wouldn’t eat, was very thin and her feathers were falling out by the handful. I didn’t think she’d make it. A friend of mine found reference to treating with Cephlex and I happened to have an unused bottle so we did a 21 day course by dropper, using Vetricyn poultry spray on the area and changing a gauze dressing with applied neosporin daily and some soaking in iodine.
Well she came back- rapidly gained her weight back, feathers have filled out and she’s eating treats and talking back per her usual and I put her out in the soft grassy part of our property a few hours a day to get some exercise and see her sisters through the fence.
But the foot is still quite swollen. Please see photos- the bumbled foot vs the healthy one. This is nothing like the swelling when this started - her entire leg was literally 6x the width of the other, it blew up so fast. But I am concerned with the bottom of the foot- do you think this is another bumble or a thick scabbing that just is taking a while to heal? She’s doing excellent in every other way but still limping on this leg. I don’t want to put her back out until I am confident she can hold onto a roost to sleep. Any advice would be appreciated- we are in an urban area with no vet for chickens and have never had this issue before with any of our birds.
I need some advice. I have a nearly 10 year old chicken who was attacked by a racoon 2 months ago (all in the coop were injured or killed). At first she showed no outward injury- we thought she had been shoved off the roost in the panic of the other birds and it seemed the ankle was broken or badly sprained as she was favouring it heavily, hopping and the leg itself at the ankle was grossly swollen.
We splinted this and kept her indoors and the swelling began to go down. Once she got restless to go back out I put her out with the splint and took it off when she really wanted to walk without it. Seemed to be doing well.
A week later I saw her laying in the yard and inspecting our back camera it seemed she had been laying by herself in a corner. On inspection I found her belly completely bare of feathers and she was markedly thinner. I took her indoors and found that same foot was swollen grossly again and the bottom was completely black. When I spread the toes this time I found that the third toe was deeply split into the flesh so I assume this is where infection got in. Over the next day or so it turned green and pussed and so she was brought in and set up more permanently in our dog’s large crate with towels for padding.
We’d never had a bird with a bumble before and didn’t know what to do- a few days later the black area got so big and hard I ended up removing with a sterile blade. At this point my poor bird wouldn’t eat, was very thin and her feathers were falling out by the handful. I didn’t think she’d make it. A friend of mine found reference to treating with Cephlex and I happened to have an unused bottle so we did a 21 day course by dropper, using Vetricyn poultry spray on the area and changing a gauze dressing with applied neosporin daily and some soaking in iodine.
Well she came back- rapidly gained her weight back, feathers have filled out and she’s eating treats and talking back per her usual and I put her out in the soft grassy part of our property a few hours a day to get some exercise and see her sisters through the fence.
But the foot is still quite swollen. Please see photos- the bumbled foot vs the healthy one. This is nothing like the swelling when this started - her entire leg was literally 6x the width of the other, it blew up so fast. But I am concerned with the bottom of the foot- do you think this is another bumble or a thick scabbing that just is taking a while to heal? She’s doing excellent in every other way but still limping on this leg. I don’t want to put her back out until I am confident she can hold onto a roost to sleep. Any advice would be appreciated- we are in an urban area with no vet for chickens and have never had this issue before with any of our birds.
