[Faye.Lear]

Last week I wormed my hens with Flubenvet and since then 2 have become sick.
They both sound chesty and their eyes are foamy and mostly stay closed.

Is this linked to worming them or is it something else?

They will wander around the garden but aren't really eating or drinking much, and are separated from the flock under a heat lamp at night, is there anything else I could be be doing?

Any help much appreciated as always thank you.

[SallyintNorth]

Personally, with two sick with symptoms which could be avian flu, I'd be isolating them and speaking to my vet.  (Which is exactly what we did a while back, when we had one sneezing.)

Highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) is the more serious type. It is often fatal in birds. The main clinical signs of HPAI in birds are:

swollen head
blue discolouration of neck and throat
loss of appetite
respiratory distress such as gaping beak, coughing, sneezing, gurgling, rattling
diarrhoea
fewer eggs laid
increased mortality

[Eve]

Bird flu or a respiratory disease such as mycoplasma. Definitely need to go to the vet.
Good luck 

[Marches Farmer]

Isolate.  Vet.

[farmers wife]

def mycoplasma - get some injectable tylan.  Sadly its brought in by wild birds and some survive while other need to be culled.  There is plenty of info on the net unless you can afford a vets visit just get the Tylan. Most vets dont deal with poultry some are clueless.  More than likely its been passed to the other hens.  Once they have it they always will and any stressful instances will bring the illness out.  With Myco you shouldnt bring any further birds into the flock and most def not raise chicks.


Im currently living with a flock like this and stuck now as cant increase my numbers.  Specialist poultry vets advise to buy only vaccinated flocks from the same source.

[Eve]

I've had a flock with myco G and S (had a bloodtest done so certain), a few outbreaks but then nothing for years. New additions didn't suffer either even though none of those were vaccinated. As long as they weren't stressed (e.g. move) they were fine.

[chrismahon]

Not due to the worming unless perhaps you overdosed them when mixing it?


Sounds like Mycoplasma which is not necessarily serious as it only flares up when stressed to due perhaps to poor welfare, a change of circumstance, bad weather or weak stock. Our neighbour's surviving lonely (French) hen has had it on and off for 3 years, so we took her over, wormed her, gave her a cosy coop, and fed her on decent pellets. All the symptoms have quickly disappeared. We have had Myco carried in our flock for years and have added new stock without incident. The only reason we knew we had it was when a hen became run-down and the symptoms appeared. We have hatched chicks but did so by machine, certainly not with a broody. The chicks when old enough were added to a certainly infected breeding pair and we have had no problems.


It could perhaps also be Avian flue, or Infectious Bronchitis. It could be a Myco flare-up caused by a depressed immune system resulting from the toxins given off from dying worms in a hen that had a very heavy worm burden. Try giving each a one-off shot of 0.5mL Cod Liver Oil.


I read somewhere that approximately half of all stock carries Myco anyway and eventually all will have it with only the strong and healthy surviving. On that basis I wouldn't worry about avoiding it.

[Daleswoman]

I have a hen who occasionally gets 'foamy' eyes and looks ill. On the first occasion I got the vet to have a look as he was here on a routine visit to my cattle, and the advice was just to isolate her. She recovered, and has recovered from two similar episodes since. She has a strange vocal tic as well, a strange high-pitched sound a bit like the end of a sneeze, that she's always had. So I would isolate your hens and keep a watchful eye for a few days. If it were me and I was really concerned that they were suffering, I'd cull them, similarly if I suspected bird flu - only in that case I'd take them to the vet for post mortems.  It doesn't honestly sound like bird flu to me as they aren't showing many of the symptoms.

[Marches Farmer]

I've always culled birds with myco. and now only buy in hatching eggs.  Once it's in a flock birds with any kind of stress are vulnerable, whether it be moulting, brooding, starting to lay ....  and some in a batch are always doing at least one of those, so you never get rid of it.