[Harlequin]

Okay, this is one of the major reasons behind my finding of this forum.
Our main rooster is a big Rhode Island Red (well, he's not THAT big, but big compared to the others, 'specially his little grey speckled rival.)

In any case he is sick and I don't know what is wrong with him.
He was fine for the last five months, but recently he's really degraded, it started with one of his eyes, which we'd thought had got damaged.
Now though, he sort of froths at the mouth with a pale white-ish foam, although not regularly, his eyes are almost always closed and seem to be quite heavily bloodshot.  
He leans to one side a bit and seems to have problems with stability and coordination, he definitely has vision problems as he well attempt to eat and miss his target several times, the only way to ensure he eats is to place foot in very large chunks.

The only thing I can think to do is give him a dose of antibiotics and hope he pulls through...

Please help! His name is Zork and he's my first rooster! He's not as chirpy as our little grey but he's a good chook who makes sure the hens are safe, what can I do?

[muntjac]

zork neds to get to a vetinary clinic,preferably one that deals with chucks .

[Aunt Sally]

I'd agree with Munty - Vet time - this is not a diagnosis just a guess, mycoplasma, which neads specific meds.

[Foxy]

I'm no expert (although can help with humans!!) definately take to a vet - sounds like an upper rispiratory infection -as started in his eyes and there is discharge from his beak. wondered in the meantime that crushed garlic in their drinking water might be useful. Can you hear any rattling or wheezing? Also are his eyes bulging or crusty at all?
Hope this helps he sounds like a real character!

[Aunt Sally]

Mycoplasma is most often a secondary infection of the upper respiratory tract and may not have any rattly sounds from the chest.  It often has nasal discharge and frothiness about the eyes.  There is quite a number of antibiotics which can be used to treat it but often takes quite a long time, and may reoccur.  It does need to be treated by a Vet.

having said that it may well be something entirely different  :!:

[Harlequin]

Well it'll be a few days before we can go into town, so I'll try the crushed garlic for a stopgap.
Well he does have frothiness about the eyes actually...
Okay, so definitely a vet job seems to be the conclusion here, I'll try that soon and get back to you guys.

[Aunt Sally]

Good luck !  Do let us know how he gets on  

[Harlequin]

So its not good.
Garlic didn't seem to help much, but I can't be sure he even ate it.
When I checked him in the morning he had an almost constant string of mucus coming outa his mouth and both his eyes were noticeably inflamed, one to the point of being stuck closed and the other half-closed and filmy.
In any case, I cleaned him up and let him go for a while, he didn't seem to be getting much better...soon returned to jsut standing around because he can't walk well.
God you could smell him like, six feet away, very rotten.
Not to mention our second rooster, a little grey Bantam was giving him all types of strife and poor Zork couldn't even fight back because he was blind! He could only try to hide his head from the little grey.
It was so sad! So I went in and carried him away.
Fast forward and basically the vet says that it'll cost 70 dollars to treat him, twenty-five just to look at him and the antibiotics are about 45 dollars.
She also said that it was likely to have repeat infections and wasn't even sure the antibiotics would work, said we'd waited too long so it wasn't even a sure deal that he'd make it back as it was already very bad.
And what with a lot of the work that needs doing 'round here it's really not economically viable to spend so much on a single rooster, not when its for a problem that could apparently easily show up again and might not even get fixed, unfortunately I don't have a job yet either so I can't pay it.
So on that very grim note it was pretty much an R.I.P, I found Zork a nice tree for him to sit on out in one of the unused paddocks, the dogs are around so he probably won't get foxed, I said my goodbyes and gave him a last good pat, made sure he had a nice branch where he wouldn't fall off...
This way he gets a nice quite death and we don't have to watch him suffer.
I would have put him out of his misery myself, but I don't have the heart too, since there's no really humane way of doing it.
Sorry, I'm just a little emotional, tearing up a bit.

[Selkie]

oh that's so sad

[frazzy]

aw poor thing is there no way you can get some body else to put him out of his misery poor guy  :cry:

[Selkie]

aw poor thing is there no way you can get some body else to put him out of his misery poor guy  :cry:

how about a neighbour or someone?

[Aunt Sally]

I feared as much Harlequin. Very sad but if infection are untreated for a while there is often no way back.  Sound (or smells) as if he had a really serious bacterial (and probably mycoplasmal) infection.  

It would have been kinder to have culled him but if you have no means or ability to do it then natures way is better than a botched attempt.

I agree that treatment by the vet was NOT an option for him  :cry:

Do keep in touch and tell us how your getting on  

[Harlequin]

Asking a neighbour to kill our chickens would be a bit much, 'sides most of them are cow or veggie farmers so it isn't like they have more experience.  
The options were throttle him, which would be pretty icky, try to lob his head off with an axe or cleaver (which are both of questionable sharpness, so this is quite out of the question) or let nature take its course.
As I said I would have killed him, but I don't have the heart...there's really no one else to do it.
Maybe if he's still hanging around in a few days I'll be able to do it or try to find someone else I know who could do it...somewhere... coz I don't want to see him dragging on too far, deserves a better death than that.  I'll try to get a better tool so if I ever have to do it it'll be a quick-clean sorta thing.

Anyhow, I'll keep in touch, we still have one little rooster and we're planning on getting a few more chooks soon, we'll manage, and I'll learn from this too, as soon as a chicken gets sick I'll start taking countermeasures.

Thanks for the support guys.

[Selkie]

culling

harlequin, did you read this thread? don't know if you would be able to get a similar hand held device in australia, but sounds like it might come in handy in the future.

[Aunt Sally]

This topic gives a good step by step account of how to kill a chicken

http://www.chat.allotment-garden.org/viewtopic.php?t=8581