Fowl Pox?

[NestingMillenial]

Ok, so I think fowl pox is running through my flock (acquired last Friday btw - talk about bad luck )

Only one shows symptoms, she's lethargic and very thin - I attached a picture of her face
She kept a bit aside yesterday and seemed to nap a bit more throughout the day but nothing too worrying until today. Today however, she was staying alone, around the coop and just lethargic. She's usually the most skittish one, and she barely even tried to get away from me while napping, which was a bit weird. She got more lively when I tried to catch her though. Once I got a hold of her, I saw the sores on her comb and wattle. She is also very thin (so maybe she was already not eating enough before those 2 days - I don't know how fast a chicken becomes thin!)

What can I do to support her? Should I force feed her? One blister on one side of her comb is raw, so I'll disinfect it, and keep an eye on the rest but let me know if there's anything you'd recommend.
Edit: while doing that I discovered some white deposits at the base of her feathers on her face - is that lice? After that I checked her body as well and saw two small brown things running, so I'm assuming those are mites... I have had her for 7 days and never had chickens in that backyard before. Either free ranging a chicken in a backyard is very dangerous parasite-wise or she came from the grower with all that already on board

Also are the other pullets still vaccinable once exposed?
Anything I can do to try and keep them from having to go through it or is it pretty safe to say this will go through the whole flock, at this point ?

If there's nothing I can do, and given that the others don't pick on or target in any way the sick one, I'm thinking of letting her go back with them (I have her un a dog crate right now) so she's at least less stressed out by this...

 

[Wyorp Rock]

It does look like Dry Fowl Pox. You can paint the lesions with Iodine if you wish but take care to not disturb the scabs.
Dry form of Fowl Pox will usually run it's course over several weeks. It's a virus spread mainly by mosquitoes. Once recovered, birds have resistance.
Here's some reading for you https://the-chicken-chick.com/fowl-pox-prevention-treatmen/

Yes, those look like lice nits. You can find Permethrin based poultry spray or dust at stores like TSC. Treat birds and housing. I like to buy Permethrin concentrate to mix up and spray housing, but use dust on the birds, so I keep both forms on hand. For the dust I put it in a sock and use it like a powder puff to apply the dust working it into the feathers and down to the skin.

What do the hen's poop look like?

They have been stressed by the move for sure.

IF possible, take some poop samples to your vet to see if worms and/or Coccidiosis are an issue.
If that's not an option, then I'd be inclined to also treat for Coccidiosis since they are on new ground and have been for a week or so. Corid is found in the cattle section of TSC, it comes in liquid or powder. Liquid Dose is 2 tsp or Powdered Dose is 1 1/2tsp per gallon of drinking water given for 5-7 days. Don't add extra supplements or vitamins that contain B1 (Thiamine) to the water or feed during the course of treatment.

Lastly. Again, a fecal float would tell you if worms are an issue. But I'd deworm them too. You can do this after you treat for Coccidiosis if you wish. Safeguard (Fenbendazole) dose is 0.23ml per pound of weight given orally once a day for 5 days in a row.

Provide them with their normal nutritionally balanced feed. Limit treats. See that they are eating/drinking well.
Hopefully once you get the lice/mites gone, they get settled down into their new home things will get a little better.

Fwiw - me personally, I'd leave her with her flock, treat her daily and monitor her.

 

[NestingMillenial]

I attached pictures of her poop in the crate this morning (and close up, once I wiped it out).
I have been cleaning their poop in the coop daily and as far as I can tell the other's look normal, better formed than this, with no gut lining or worm looking shapes in it. This morning when I let the others out, I also looked for lice on their heads and didn't see any (I would have to catch them to be 100% sure though). Is a weaker chicken prone to higher parasite loads within a flock? I guess it'd make sense.

Yesterday, while handling her, I noticed her vent was leaking a pale yellow-ish substance.. didn't notice the tell tale yeast smell, but she might also have vent gleet? She had barely eaten all day (if at all), so is it possible she just had very watery, unsmelling poop?

I'll see if a vet around here could do a fecal float asap.

I put her back with her flock this morning and she looked rather lively and I saw her forage and eat with them. She pauses at times and stands aside, seemingly taking a little nap, then resume. So at least there's that. I did end up force feeding her a bit of their fermented feed yesterday. I had to pry her beak open and deposit a small quantity of feed in it and then she'd swallow it by herself. I think she only ate a couple tsp that way though, I didn't want to over do it.

I'll spray the coop today and tonight, when they go in for the night, I'll catch them and treat them for lices and mites too.

(It's just a side question but... is it possible she caught all those things from being stressed by the move and within just a week of free ranging our backyard?? This backyard has not had chickens in it for at least 12 years prior, and we just built the coop. Two houses, each a block or two away, have chickens around here and we have neither seen them nor been there (I just hear their roosters in the morning), that's it. So I wonder how she managed to get all those things at once. Is the henhouse we got them from partly to blame? The place only had great reviews everywhere I could look online.
It doesn't change anything to my situation, but I am feeling very bewildered by this whole ordeal and just trying to understand it, I guess.)

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Yesterday, while handling her, I noticed her vent was leaking a pale yellow-ish substance.. didn't notice the tell tale yeast smell, but she might also have vent gleet? She had barely eaten all day (if at all), so is it possible she just had very watery, unsmelling poop?

Has she laid any eggs?
Photo of the vent with the leaking substance would be good.

I'd get the fecal float if possible, but the poop doesn't look normal to me.
I'd treat the whole flock for worms and coccidiosis.

For this Gal, I'd get some Calcium Citrate with D3 and give her 1 tablet daily for a week. Leaking a yellowish substance can be a number of things, but I'd worry about that being egg material and the cause of lethargy is a ruptured membrane.

What are you feeding?
Do you provide oyster shell and grit (crushed granite) free choice?

Yes, parasites can take advantage of weaker birds. Lice/mites and worms can be a common nuisance that need to be addressed periodically. Some folks deworm twice a year, while other find they need to more frequently.

Sometimes when you bring in adult birds, they come with issues. It's unfortunate, but it doesn't seem like you are alone. No one can say where or how the birds ended up with parasites, but more than likely they came with them. I understand you've had a lot of stress dealing with getting these newbies from the breeder. Give it time to resolve.

 

[NestingMillenial]

Ok, when I catch them again tonight to dust them against lice and mites, I'll take a picture of her vent too. It wasn't as yellow as an egg yolk if that helps, it was rather close to what I have seen vent gleet milky exudate look like in pics around here. I'll update once I have a pic though!

(Oh and I meant the poop of the others, in the coop, looked normal, I think - I attached a pic of those, in case it actually doesn't and I just couldn't tell - but yeah, the sick one's definitely less so)

I feed them a grower feed, that I ferment and they have free access to oyster shells (the henhouse specified that they should have access to those, so I assume they were already given oyster shells over there too, but they don't seem to eat much of it though. I don't see the bowl emptying much). I didn't provide grits so far because they free range the backyard all day and a good part of it is on old gravel. Would you recommend to still get them some grits all the same?

When I picked them up, I was told they were around 36 weeks old (I originally thought they'd be younger, hence the grower feed I picked, but I learned since that it's as well to keep them on a higher protein diet, so I kept ot that way regardless). So technically they were laying at the henhouse already. After the move, our Black Copper Maran laid two eggs (on day 2 and 3 - she went up to he nesting boxes on day 5 but didn't lay in the end) then stopped, one of our Australorps has been laying daily since the move, without interruption. Others are not laying but we thought it was ok as we read it can take around two weeks for them to acclimate. We had to drive only around 30min when we picked them up but I assume it's stressful for them all the same.

Thank you for all your help!
I'll update with pictures of her vent later today.

 

[NestingMillenial]

Update: she's still alternating between going around with the flock + eating, and napping (with or without the flock around her for the latter). It's been suddenly cold here and they are enjoying the sun this afternoon, so they are all napping a bit, on and off, to be fair. But I feel maybe she's holding herself with a more rounded back/rump than usual so I thought I'd add a picture of her stance, both while standing still and while napping.

(Oh and don't mind the missing butt feathers, we got them all like that, with more or less of it missing, and where told it was because of the ever smaller flock going rounds and round the pecking order at each new sale - feathers are mostly broken, not pulled, and skin is healthy on all of them on that area. There has not been any more plucking/percking since they've arrived though)

 

[NestingMillenial]

Ok, I think I'm way over zealous about updates and details. I hope I'm not being a pain, I'm just not sure what's important... So upate 2:

I had garden sulfur at hand (I had bought it to make them a dust bath) so I put that in a fabric bag, like you said, and dusted the hell out of all the pullets, especially the sick one (a Welbar). I didn't see any evidence that the other ones had any mite or lice but the sick one was definitely carrying both. I'll also put up dusting bags in the coop with sulfur. Hopefully that should take care of that! I'm planning on redoing the whole thing in 2 weeks or so, in case some eggs made it through the first dusting.
Sulfur I used: https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/bonide-sulfur-plant-fungicide-micronized-spray-or-dust

Finally while doing that I took pictures of a couple more things:

1) the sick pullet's vent: it's not crazy bad looking and you wouldn't see it without lifting her feathers, but there is some discharge. Would you still recommend to get her calcium? I can grab some tomorrow. Would it be good to just give that supplement to all the pullets, to be safe?
Also, the sick pullet's skin looked very thin... Maybe because she's underweight a bit and/or dehydrated a bit. I syringesd some water + electrolytes (sav-a-chick) but only around 5ml and then I gave her some of her wet (fermented food), probably around 1-2 tbs. I saw her forage throughout the day, but I wanted to make sure she had a bit more before the night. I didn't dare giving her too much at once though, hope that was ok.

2) I read that scaly leg mites can sometimes attack combs and wattles so I took pictures of the feet of two pullets. The one I am not sure about is the other Welbar (blonde legs) all the others pullets' legs where definitely looking like the black legs on the picture, which seem good to me.
Btw, this other Welbar lost a bunch of dawn feathers as I was dusting and handling her - I hope that doesn't mean I stressed her too much or anything!

3) one pullet (an Australorp) had a worse feather plucked butt than the others when we got her. I took pictures of it: on the left side, the arrow points at a place that seemed a tiny bit scratched/bloody. Apart from that one place her skin was perfectly healthy. On the right side of the picture, we can see the skin has little black dots, which I'm assuming are feathers coming back? Above that area, the longer feathers are clearly broken too. I am not witnessing anymore plucking/pecking at all during the day. Does she look like she's doing ok and on a good trajectory?

4) finally, I took a picture of one pullet (another Australorp) who had a seemingly slightly swollen and discolored area on her face, below the ear. I am not sure if I am imagining things at this point or not, but I'm attaching a pic all the same, to be safe.

They are definitely molting too, btw: several had feathers sheath on their neck.

Tomorrow, I'll call the vets around here and see if one accepts to run fecal floats for the flock and take it from there regarding coccidiosis and worms.

 

[Wyorp Rock]

1. Yes, I'd give her the Calcium. Wash her vent with a weak solution of diluted Apple Cider Vinegar and apply an anti-fungal cream around the vent. It may just be some crusty poop, residue from egg or possible vent gleet, but usually vent gleet is more of a thick white yeasty smelling pasty material that coats the vent and skin underneath.

Offer feed free choice during waking hours.

2. I don't see anything too concerning about the legs, but the nails can use a trim. If you wish, you can always rub a little vaseline, oil or NuStock cream up under scales and into the feet/legs of your hens. It won't hurt anything.

3. Looks like feathers coming in, a few scabs from picking. Skin and oil gland looks o.k.

4. Looks like her earlobe, unless I'm missing something.

 

[NestingMillenial]

Ok, awesome, so basically nothing more than what we were already dealing with, which is perfect because it was already a lot for one pullet!

I'll get them the calcium tomorrow. Would it be good to give it to all of them while I'm at it?

Thank you again for all your help and checking my myriad pictures! ^^
I'll update with their progress!

 

[Wyorp Rock]

No, I wouldn't give the extra calcium to the rest, just her.