Fowl Pox in Backyard Chickens

Today's episode is part of our "Summer Series on Keeping Your Backyard Flock Healthy and Happy in the Warmer Months." 

You can read our blog posts about each of our summer series here: Wilma's Summer Series 

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Hello, my beautiful people. And welcome back to another episode of Wilma. The wonder hands podcast. I am Mel . The creator in today's episode is part of our summer series. And today is about foul pops . Yes, avian pox . I know we should refer to it as chicken PS , but it's not the same thing as the human chicken palms, which really doesn't make sense. But Ian let's get over our disclaimers one . You'll probably hear miss pumpkin in the background. She is currently sitting on a dozen coil eggs and she is quite mean, and honoring, you may also hear Paul, which was formally known as poly pocket . My quail, that is , uh , a lone quail. That is our pet that is inside the house. Paul or poly has started growing. So we know for a fact that it is in fact, a Brewster . I am also not a veterinarian, nor do I play one on this podcast. So whatever information I share with you is gonna be through the scientific , uh , area of the interwebs, which is like Merck vet.com , poultry DMV. I will also be referencing some of Gale Damour rose book, the chicken , uh , health handbook, and at my own firsthand experience because the heifer farm has had in the past foul PX , the dry kind , Hey, y'all I'm Mel and you are listening to Wilma the wonder hand , are you a chicken mouth loving mama and daddy together? We'll dive into the latest poultry keeping adventures chat about everyday life. We're the generous mix of some hilarious stories, bringing you fascinating interviews with poultry owners from all over you'll find tips and basic advice from your local veterinarians, along with new chicken, keeping gadgets and reviews. I'm gonna see what Mr. JS and Wilma has to say about that. We're going to encourage and help you build a stronger, healthier flop . Let's go see what Mr . JS and Wilma is up to. Let's go let these heifers out. So yes, FPO comes in a dry or a wet. It can go from wet to dry or dry to wet. The most common is gonna be your dry, but we're gonna go over both of those. Also a note. This is part of our summer series because during the warm months, this is when all the flies and the mosquitoes , uh , they seem to be the most problem. So this is what we can do to try and minimize our Fox risk. There's also a vaccine. Uh , I would highly recommend that you ask your veterinarian about that. And from what I've read online, that once your flock does have it, they can build up an immunity to it. How long that immunity lasts. I don't know. I really couldn't find a whole lot of information on that. Some say a lifetime, some say six months, some say, you know, various times Mylock had it three years ago and we have not had it since first. We're gonna kind of go over file PX or otherwise you may hear it known as avian pox . That is the dry PX . The wet PX is gonna be, we're gonna do last because it is definitely a different scenario. And it is also much more serious than the dry PX with the dry P . Um, it takes four to 10 days for like an incubation period. And it could take up to 10 weeks to run through your whole entire flock. Dry PX is a virus just like wet PX , but a dry PX is definitely more common and it is not as frightening as wet PX , wet PX , uh , can be deadly. So a dry PX , you may notice , um, small, white pimple like button , uh , bumps , uh , on their comb. Mainly you're gonna see this in non feathered places. So like on their eyelids , uh , their head and neck, certain areas, their WATS, maybe their feet, their legs, and they look like little blisters and they may be SW you may see some swelling and your flock may generally just not feel good. Overall. Now these , um , lesions can appear to look like pecking , uh , injuries. Uh , the difference that I visually seen in my flock is it has like a thickening. It has almost a yellow or white kind of ashy looking tent to it. I noticed one day, Mr. Jangles , he had some Peck marks on his comb. What I thought were Peck marks. And the end later on that day, I noticed after I'd been taking pictures of them, I noticed several of the other girls had the same marks. And I thought, wow , they must be some really big fighting going on because, you know, they can , uh , leave marks on their Combs and, you know, they get wild and start fighting over stuff. But I noticed , uh , several other girls and , uh , that's what I knew something else was going on. And you could see them towards the bottom of their bottles and , uh , around their ear, you know, where there's no feathers there. So I knew this had to be ox now with the dry box , it can take up to two weeks for an individual bird to , um , for the blisters to kind of sloth off. They'll dry up and they'll sloth off. And it can take 10 weeks , uh , to go through the whole entire flock, which it did take a couple of months here for everyone's , um, little blisters to heal up and fall off. Now you'll also notice that egg production can , uh , be reduced. Uh , it's a virus. So if you have a virus, you know, your body naturally is just trying to fight it off and you don't feel good. So in laying hints , that's the thing, the first thing that's gonna kind of , uh , slack off now with dry PX , the most important part is you want to keep those , uh , lesions , uh , clean and you want to keep them , um, treated, you can use diluted betaine and you can use saline solution. Um, you can spray a little bit of the vet spray on a cotton swab and, you know , uh , put that on their , uh , lesions, wherever they may be. You just wanna be careful if it's close to their eyes, you know, obviously you don't want to be putting betaine in your Burn's eye. Now, if you have access to a veterinarian, I definitely call them. And this is when they can discuss with you about giving a vaccine. I do not know anything about buying a vaccine. There are lots of Infor , there is lots of information online about obtaining that vaccine, but the vaccine has to be done in a very particular way. So like I said, there is a vaccine, but I personally would speak to a professional on it. Maybe a professional breeder, maybe, you know, someone who has a lot of experience with these vaccines and with dry PX , you don't want it to turn into wet PX . So this is where you wanna be extra clean. You want to make sure that all the waters are cleaned. I would clean my waterers daily with a solution of vinegar and water. I would keep their area clean. You know, you , these are things that we would do anyways, but it's gonna spread through your flock one way or another. If they're living in close contact with each other, it spread through dander , it , spread through drinking through their water, it spread through their feathers. So if you have one that is looking particularly sick, and this is where dry PX can turn into wet PX , I would definitely separate this one. Wet PX is when it starts to become a respiratory issue. Thankfully, all of mine just went through the regular dry pox . Uh , nobody , uh , appeared to have any type of respiratory illness. So we are very grateful for that. I did keep their lesions very, very clean. Now this virus , uh , can , um, survive for months through dander and feathers. So after the dry pox ran its course here, I completely cleaned out everything. I cleaned out all their bedding. Like I said, we kept the water as extra, extra clean. I made sure everything was cleaned. Uh , so that to help, you know, reduce the chances of it staying longer here. Uh , so yeah, keeping up with all of that was super important. Moving on to wet pox . That's what we're gonna take the majority of the time on this podcast, because it is the one, it is the variety OXS , that is definitely more , um , deadly. It's something that you wanna pay really close attention to. That's see why it's important to keep those lesions clean, you know, pay very, very close attention to see if any type of respiratory issue starts to develop along with the lesions, moving on to wet PX , which is also known as foul diptheria. It is an upper upper respiratory , um , virus. And the incubation time is the same four to 10 days. It could take two weeks to 10 weeks to run through your entire flock. You'll notice with wet pox , they still will have those lesions. They will have nasal discharge. Uh , there will be a dis uh , a decrease in egg production, which is just means your hands are just not feeling good , uh , that you could notice weight loss , uh , definitely lethargy. Uh, the raised yellow , uh , lesions are not just on the outside. They will move to the throat, the mouth, the tongue, it can block the sinuses. It can block airway. Now this can also look like some other respiratory , uh , issues. Also the , um , cheesy like material inside of their mouth. This can resemble canker . Now the dry PX can turn into a secondary infection like wet PX . Uh , this can, their lesions can turn into a bacterial infection. And this is where antibiotics would be used. If you see a member of your flock that is suffering from the wet PX , I would definitely isolate this bird. Now with dry PX , you can just let it run through your flock unless you have one that is really, you know, struggling with it. But wet PX is definitely something I would separate my bird from the flock, even though the rest of them may have already been exposed. You don't want this bird to be picked on. So I would definitely , uh , separate that bird and keep the lesions as clean. And I would contact your veterinarian about some type of antibiotic. If you are suspecting a bacterial infection, you can go back and listen to our last week's podcast, which is part of our summer series on how to control flies and things like that in your , uh , co and run area. Obviously it's gonna be hard to control, you know, big bodies of water , uh , but we can minimize in our yard and on our properties and near our runs and stuff. You know, if you have any buckets of water, just kind of laying around, you know, keeping those empty, keeping the fly traps up, however way that you, you know, manage your flies. We did have some great ideas on last week's podcast. So just being aware of these things, you know, to cut down, like with us, we have a Creek that runs through the back of our property. You know, I can't get rid of the Creek. So I just have to try and minimize what I can control, minimizing their exposure to, you know, tons and tons of mosquitoes. You can't get rid of all of them, but we can do these things to kind of prevent them. But in the end, you know, we can't do everything. We can't put them in a bubble and protect them from every single thing. Although we would love to , uh , they still have to be chickens and still have to do their thing. But I think the more we know the more educated we are, then the more compassion we can share for them. So the more we know, the more that we can take action and try and prevent these things, but don't feel bad if you can't prevent it because I felt bad too . When I finally figured out that my flock had fall pox and I mean, it, we try so hard to do all the right things and then things do still happen. So we just learn from them and we move on. I really hope y'all are enjoying these little mini series . They are not very long, and I don't go into tons and tons of scientific , uh, information, which I could share, but I don't think that's valuable to everyone. I think we just need it in little bite sizes that we can apply that , uh , to our own flock . If you have experienced dry PX or wet PX , I would love to know you can send us an email. You can give us, send us a DM on Instagram at wi with the wonder, hand.com . We are also on Pinterest. We are on , uh , TikTok . And we also have a blog, which is blog dot Wil with the wonder, hand.com . And we're gonna be posting all these articles in long form . So instead of listening, just listening on our podcast, you can also go read them and we will be sharing pictures and lots of other details. We would appreciate it. If you would , uh , leave us a review or share this with a friend, it does help us immensely. And it means a whole lot to us. And until next time y'all bye y'all . I'm Mel . And .