Help diagnos my sick birds please ?

island birdman · **Posted:** Mon Mar 31, 2008 7:54 am

I have free ranging guinea fowl and peackocks. There are some chickens but they are kept locked up in a hen house and do not have access to or share with the guineas or peacocks. About three months ago I got a sick guinea fowl who got lethargic and went very green around the head and eventually just died. About four weeks later the same happened to an adult Peacock. Now I have another guinea fowl showing the same symptoms. They just get very doey, slow and lethargic and then keel over. It seems to happen over the space of a week or two and about four weeks between each bird getting sick. The only space they share is the feeding point but I have now changed that. They dont share water and they free range all over the place. What should I do ???

bunyanuternie · **Joined:** Wed Jul 11, 2007 10:31 pm **Posts:** 2903

It could be Blackhead ?? if So you will need to treat them , Have a look in the stickys for Blackhead , Do they have any other symptoms?

island birdman · **Posted:** Mon Mar 31, 2008 8:59 am

The only other thing I have noticed is that the guniea fowl seem to try and clear their throat a lot by moving there heads back and forth trying to regurgitate something. Other than that they just get slower and slower until they can't move around much at all.

bunyanuternie · **Joined:** Wed Jul 11, 2007 10:31 pm **Posts:** 2903

That sounds like a respiritory Thing , Their is a Sticky on CRD , Have a read of it and see if the Symptoms Match

joc1 · **Joined:** Sat Dec 22, 2007 5:31 pm **Posts:** 35

Could also be gape worm and explain why the mutual feed source would contribute. CRD would be more virulent but gape work would take a while.

J

bunyanuternie · **Joined:** Wed Jul 11, 2007 10:31 pm **Posts:** 2903

Words of wisdom

We have never had to worry about Gape out here , but U may be right

Deans' Poultry · **Posted:** Mon Mar 31, 2008 3:28 pm

We had a rir pol pullet die a few weeks ago. It had a real twitching about it's head, it's eyes were very sleepy looking and was very lethargic.
I isolated her when she first showed signs of looking a little sick and started giving her a dose of tylan each day for about 5 days as i thought it was crd. Well by day 6 she was really crook and decided i'd put her out of her misery.
Upon breaking her neck i noticed a disgusting rotten smell and quite a bit of fluid came from it's mouth and was a yellowy colour. I rang my vet straight away and he said it had a condition called egg peratynitus(sp??) It's when the egg can't get passed and therefore goes rotten inside the chook :shock:

I've never even heard of this before but i'm wondering if it could possibly be the same thing? :-?

EDIT- while she was crook she was also showing those regurgitation actions

joc1 · **Joined:** Sat Dec 22, 2007 5:31 pm **Posts:** 35

Egg Peritonitis would eventually infect the chook inside so that she couldnt digest, basically blocking off the crop. The foul smelling liquid could be an effect of feed rotting in the crop. Also the crop works via muscular activity.

The only reason I suggest gape worm is that the worm is in the throat, causing them to gape as if feed is stuck in the throat. The "greenish" head colour could be as the worm grows large enough to block the throat so then lack of oxygen causing the head to turn blue/green. Lethargy would then happen as it cant breath and eventual death.

Obvioulsy it would take time and OP says it has happened over a 3 month span with about a month between events.

Birdman, see if you can get the current sick one and check down its throat. How often have you wormed the birds?

J

Deans' Poultry · **Posted:** Mon Mar 31, 2008 7:42 pm

Thanx jocler, where would all the fluid have come from do you think? Could that have been the egg trying to make it's way out the wrong end? Or stomach acid, or maybe a combo of both? I reckon there would have had to have been 1/2 a cup of this vial liquid.

cheers

Darren

County Lodge · **Posted:** Mon Mar 31, 2008 7:57 pm

She may have had sour crop and it may or may not have been egg peritonitis that caused it. I believe it is a bacterial infection of the crop.

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