Favus

[Andrea Beaumont]

I have kept chickens for 11 years now and generally managed to maintain a healthy flock. Due to recent losses from a hawk and old age I was left with a lone chicken. I decided to purchase 5 hens in autumn last year. I have 1 sablepoot ( my old lady)2 Dutch bantams, 1 Pekin and 2 Anconas. After some settling issues all was going well until beginning of March when I noticed my Pekin was loosing head feathers. This gradually got worse and My Ancona started loosing head feathers too. I clean the coup every week and scrub once Or twice a month during dry months particularly. I pride myself in a clean run and coup. I also sprinkle diatom on every week. I started dusting them with diatom
Liberally each day but feather loss was getting worse. From looking at poultry sites I believe it is Favus, ringworm. I am treating them with Canestan, starting every night for 2 weeks then reduced it to every 3 nights, due to the stress it was causing them for me to apply the cream when they were roosting. I am 5 weeks in to treatment and have gone back to applying cream every night as it seems to be getting worse. They seem happy enough however the Pekin has gone broody now. Can anyone advise of how long this takes and whether in fact I am using the correct treatment? I would be great feel if any advice thanks

 

[Marigold]

Hi Andrea and welcome to the forum. I'm sorry it's in such stressful circumstances for you.

I haven't any experience of favus in chickens and I wondered how you came to this diagnosis. Could you perhaps post a pic or two of the affected areas? Is there any crustiness or soreness under the areas? if it is ringworm I hope you're wearing PPE when handling them as I found out when keeping ponies that it can be highly contagious. I know its difficult to get a vets advice at present but with possible health risks to yourself maybe you could get a FaceTime consultation or similar?

This link to the main Poultrykeeper site may be helpful if you have already seen it - at least to rule out some of the possibilities.
https://poultrykeeper.com/external-problems/

Without seeing any of your pictures I wondered about depluming mites
https://poultrykeeper.com/external-problems/depluming-mites/

And I found this - does it describe what your birds have got?

Ringworm (Favus)
You’ve probably heard of (or had) ringworm, a fungal infection of the skin that people and pets can catch from each other. Chickens can also get ringworm and share the fungus with their flock keepers. (Here’s a tip for word game players: Favus is the name for ringworm when it affects poultry.)

Ringworm usually appears as white scaly or crusty patches on the comb and the skin of the head and neck. The chicken may lose its feathers, typically starting at the base of the comb and progressing down the back of the neck. Other than the skin problem, affected chickens are usually healthy. The infection is contagious and spreads from bird to bird, and rarely, bird to human.

Any practicing veterinarian can do a skin scraping and fungal culture on a chicken to diagnose ringworm, the same way the fungal infection is diagnosed in other animals. If you have a chicken with favus, isolate it from the rest of the flock to prevent spreading the infection. People should wear gloves and wash their hands after handling the affected birds.

i hope others on here with more experience than me can help you as well.

 

[Andrea Beaumont]

Thanks for your reply Marigold. I had considered the depluming mite along with general mites initially howvever they have no Signs of mite debris, redness or soreness. There seems to be no irritation or scratching all of Which would suggest mites. They seem well in themselves and the feather loss started on the head and is now going down theIr necks and chest. I got some advice from a chicken supplies company who suggested Favus. The description you attached for Favus is exactly what I see. A white sheen in their combs was the thing I didn’t initially notice. I am not sure how to upload photos to this site but will try tomorrow.

 

[Marigold]

Click on Full Editor and Preview under the text window.
Then on Attachments
then Add Files which takes you to your own photo stream. Select your photo. You will have to reduce it to 400 X 600 if using a photo reduction app or your computer software but if its on your phone or iPad just choose medium size.
Place the cursor in the text box where you want the pic to go and click on Place Inline.
Go to Preview to check the result. This will come up above your text box.
If you're happy with your post click Submit.

 

[Andrea Beaumont]

Hi Marigold
Finally uploaded some photos of the worse effected
Girls. Photos of Pekin and Ancona
As you can see the Parkin has no feathers on her head and her skin is very corse and dry

 

[Marigold]

Poor girls, they are having a bad hair day, aren’t they! Looks to me as if you might need to get a vets opinion on this. If you can’t take one of them to show the vet, maybe you could discuss the photos online? I expect there’s something more effective than Canestan he or she could prescribe.