Respiratory infection treatment

[DuckWhisperer06]

What can we use that’s over the counter for treating respiratory infections in chickens? I’ve seen a lot of people recommend Baytril but I’m hoping for a slightly cheaper alternative that I can get a little sooner. Thanks!

 

[Mamatomany123]

I used tylan 200. 0.06ml per pound 3x a day for 5 days. Remember respiratory infections make the chickens carriers for life so you'll need to close your flock and treat them as symptoms occur throughout their lives.

 

[Eggcessive]

It depends what symptoms you are seeing, and what disease. Some are caused by viruses, and no antibiotic will help. Same for a fungal or mild illness. But bacterial diseases such as mycoplasma gallisepticum (MG) may respond to Tylosin powder for pigeons, doxycycline, oxytetracycline, Denagard, or Baytril/enrofloxacin which by the way is banned for chickens. Coryza responds better to sulfonamides such as sulfadimethoxine or Bactrim.

MG symptoms include bubbles/foam in an eye, swelling of an eyelid or the face, sneeze or cough, rales or rattly breathing, and others. What are you seeing or hearing? Have you added a new bird to your flock in recent weeks?

 

[DuckWhisperer06]

It depends what symptoms you are seeing, and what disease. Some are caused by viruses, and no antibiotic will help. Same for a fungal or mild illness. But bacterial diseases such as mycoplasma gallisepticum (MG) may respond to Tylosin powder for pigeons, doxycycline, oxytetracycline, Denagard, or Baytril/enrofloxacin which by the way is banned for chickens. Coryza responds better to sulfonamides such as sulfadimethoxine or Bactrim.

MG symptoms include bubbles/foam in an eye, swelling of an eyelid or the face, sneeze or cough, rales or rattly breathing, and others. What are you seeing or hearing? Have you added a new bird to your flock in recent weeks?

Yes, we’ve added three new batches within the past few weeks. We got 2 Easter Eggers, 2 Olive Eggers, and 2 Crested Cream Legbars, all around 2-3 weeks, as one batch, 8 Black Copper Maran chicks, less than a week old, as another, and for the last, 11, 2 1/2 month old Jersey Giants.

 

[DuckWhisperer06]

So far, 4 of the Copper Marans, 1 Jersey Giant, and 1 from our original flock have shown signs of wheezing, gasping/shortness of breath, some form of lethargy, and the chicks have puffy eyes. The Cooper Marans are being brooded inside, as they did not get along with the first batch when we tried to put them together after they had feathered out a bit. The Jerseys have been with our original hens for a week or two now, next to the pen with the first batch. Both of those pens along with the duck pen are within about a quarter of an acre. We have a somewhat makeshift coop where all of the obviously ‘sick’ birds are, so as to try to limit the cases at the moment. We were able to pick up some Tylan 200 and gave the quarantined birds injected doses. I’ll probably wait until midday tomorrow to give a second dose, just to see there is any visible progress or issues. I don’t want to overdose at all, especially the younger chicks.

 

[Mamatomany123]

So far, 4 of the Copper Marans, 1 Jersey Giant, and 1 from our original flock have shown signs of wheezing, gasping/shortness of breath, some form of lethargy, and the chicks have puffy eyes. The Cooper Marans are being brooded inside, as they did not get along with the first batch when we tried to put them together after they had feathered out a bit. The Jerseys have been with our original hens for a week or two now, next to the pen with the first batch. Both of those pens along with the duck pen are within about a quarter of an acre. We have a somewhat makeshift coop where all of the obviously ‘sick’ birds are, so as to try to limit the cases at the moment. We were able to pick up some Tylan 200 and gave the quarantined birds injected doses. I’ll probably wait until midday tomorrow to give a second dose, just to see there is any visible progress or issues. I don’t want to overdose at all, especially the younger chicks.

If you can I would give it orally instead. Injecting it can cause necrosis of the skin.