A opposum got into our white Silkie pen and injured one of our Silkies. My husband got the opossum, but the Silkie has injuries on her back side that are pretty bad. It is late and we can't go anywhere to get anything and I'm not sure what to put on her injuries. Please give me some ideas.
HELP PLEASE
Hi Smedge, I would clean the wounds and put on a nice application of neosporin, of course seperate the wounded darling. Also there is a product called new skin and if the skin is damaged I would apply the new skin to her after three days of keeping the neosporin on her. The neo is probably one of the best over the counter products we always keep handy around here. We also like the new skin as a protection against anything getting into the open area...good luck...Hay
It sounds to me as if Haystack has answered your plea. I'll bet your Silkie will heal fine if you follow his directions. Best wishes!
We cleaned her wounds with peroxide, it has been rainy and messy here and she had gotten very dirty through this ordeal and that opossum was quite large. We brought her in where it was warmer and kept her in overnight.
She has some really big gashes and maybe some missing meat, should I put neosporin on that?
She is walking around a bit. I think as long as the opossum didn't hurt her internally she will be okay as long as we can get her wounds taken care of well enough. This was one of our white beauties. We though our Bow Tie hen Isabella was missing, but we found her hiding between the roos.
This is a picture of her last summer.
Smedge, it's amazing how they can heal.. You'd think there was a huge risk for infection, but there isn't.. As long as you cleaned the wound good.. used neosporin, it should start to heal... I wouldn't use neosporin for too long cause it keeps it too moist.. The new skin idea is a really good one too.. it helps to dry it out and close the wound.. It's like a liquid bandaid..
I had a naked neck get her neck ripped wide open the whole length of her neck, I thought she would have a huge gap.. but it healed just fine!
Injuries are almost always not as bad as they look... Our emotions are involved and it is scary to see.. but they usually heal up just fine!
I hope she heels up, she does have some pretty deep yukky gashes and the poor thing was dragged for quite a ways. She looks much better today as far as her feathers that are left, she was wet and dirty last night, she has dried and fluffed again, but her backside looks bad. I'll post a picture of her soon.
Lucky we have a dog, my husband heard her barking and went out with a light on his gun, and saw those two beady eyes. The opossum has pulled open the door on their pen and gotten in and pulled her out and had her drug off about 25 feet or so. Poor thing.
Okay, here are some pictures, warning though, they get pretty yukky looking. This one is from the front and her upper half looks pretty good. Good thing he didn't grab her by the head, she wouldn't be here.
her back side above the tail.
this is under her left wing, she is torn up pretty bad on the left side.
Ohhh Smedgekles, I am sooo sorry! At least your Hubby got that nasty critter! It also answered a question for me. So, a possum will carry off a chicken and attack from the backside. this leads me to believe that my Silkies and Orps that were found headless and middles eaten were attacked by a raccoon not a possum.
I pray your baby will heal soon!
The neosporin should be put right on the open wound, but thats why I said only use it for three days as it keeps the wound moist. It will aide in healing but after three days I would clean off the neosporin and put the new skin on to cover and dry the wound. That will allow the healing to finish while protecting the exposed area...Good luck and I sure hate seeing your baby hurt like that...Hay
Poor little thing
Anytime I have birds with a surface wound I give them 1/10 CC of penicillin and 1/10 cc of b-12 to keep them active.
Thanks Haystack!
Smedgekles, she is a real beauty, even hurt, she's gorgeous.
A cat injured one of mine once, and my dog another one, but both recovered. I was really surprised. The one with the injuries from the cat took the longest. She couldn't walk for four or five days. Honestly, I thought they were both gonners at the time.
Well, she didn't make it. She died during the night. I guess her injuries were too deep and she may have been injured internally.
This picture is of her several months ago, the one in the front. She was much more fluffy and poofy now. She was only 10 months old. Farewell my Clemintine :(
I'm so sorry. I expected her to live. I really did.
My roosters are in a horse stall in large wire dog crates. They seem to be doing ok out there. Yesterday when I went out a big fluffy cat was in there with them, which is probably fine, as he/she is mousing I assume. Surprised me though to see the cat in there. Surprised him too, as he took off like a rocket. Other animals may go in there too, and I wouldn't know it.
Come to think of it, that's probably great to have that cat in there. The mice or rats come out to get the chicken feed, and get eaten by the cat!
Anyway, I'm so sorry about your hen. She was a real beauty.
Oh no!!! I'm so sorry she didn't make it.. That is so sad.. and shocking..
Silkies are vulnerable cause they can't fly.. I would panic if I saw a big cat around my flock.. most of them are too small to get away from one. !
This is so sad..
Zzz my silkie roosters are in the wire dog crates and they are padlocked. The cat can't get to them. Even if the cat or possum reached their paw in, they have room enough to not be harmed.
I wish they had more room, and maybe... I dunno when.. I can have a chicken house and run for them, but for now they seem safe enough. As long as I keep them with food and water, I can breed them if I decide to. :)
Wouldn't it be great if you could hatch out only girl chicks?
I'll bet someone, somewhere is working on that.
Smedgekles, I am so sad to hear that she didn't make it! Such a lovely hen.
Oh no I thought she would make it to,so very sorry
It's always a difficult time when we lose those pets that have connected to our hearts. I am in deed sorry for your loose. As we all were, I was hoping in spite of the deep wounds she would recover. It was not to be but you did all you could. Thats the remarkable part of you good folks. You always do your best and your pets or fortunate for that. There are multitudes of pet owners that could care less... Just look at the rescue organizations...Hay
:.o.(.
I'm so sorry to hear that! She sure was a beauty.
I am so sorry for your loss.
I'm' really sorry she didn't make it. She was such a cutie. When Claire got attacked by the dog, we irrigated her large wound with an antiseptic spray we got at Walgreens. That seemed to wash off all the gunk, without hurting her too much. What is "new skin"? I think I should get some of that.
I am so sorry your hen didn't make it. She was a beauty. That black skin threw me for a minute. I have never had silkies.
One of my BSL pullets was attacked by a stray dog and had all the skin torn from one side of her breast. It was during the hottest part of summer and fly season was in full swing. I thought sure she would get maggots in her wound or that the wound would never cover. I sprayed it with purple gentian wound cote spray we use for our horses and I kept it slathered with sulfur salve to keep out infection and flies. I kept her in a very small coop just big enough for her to turn around in. I said if she lived it would be a miracle and that is what I'd call her. Miracle now lays eggs for me nearly 9 months later. I use the same kind of topical meds on nearly all my animals.
Thanks everyone. Our poor white Silkie roo now only has a black Silkie hen. Wonder what they would hatch, dalmation spotted chicks? We wanted to hatch babies this spring from these Silkies, but now we will need to get another white hen. We do have a set of white Bow TIe Naked Neck Silkies, but this was the only white fully fluffed one we had :(.
I think that opossum just injured her internally too badly. We discoverd it had drug her about 20 feet in one direction and had majory defeathered her and then drug her another 30 feet in the other direction where my husband caught him doing his bad deed and took care of Mr opossum. All this was over rough terrain for a little chicken and on very wet ground. Poor thing, she endured a lot, it's no wonder she didn't make it.
From what I could understand from the chicken color calculator, You will have 50% black unicolor roosters, and 50% black unicolor hens. Not positive what unicolor means, but it sounds like white is recessive.
http://www.edelras.nl/Henk69/Overzicht.htm#kipcalculator
http://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=79262&p=2
Interesting thread on silkie genetics.
if you end up with a Dalmation looking one they are worth mega bucks. You should see what people pay for what is called a Paint Silkie
Thanks for the links. We may just have to try for one of those dalmation ones, could be interesting.
Yes, I was wanting to ask where you bought her. That is a real shame. Birds of her quality are often selling for way over a hundred dollars at these online auctions. Not sure where they have moved to since eggbid went down. I found my splashes on bidbird.
The white Silkie we lost was from an egg we got from my mother-n-laws neighbor that breeds and sells show bird quality Silkies. I think he sells a dozen eggs for $50, or at least that was what they were last year.