Diseases of turkeys: photos and descriptions, treatment

Buying turkey poults or adult birds for breeding for sale, you will have to take into account the tendency of turkeys, especially poults, to diseases. There is even an opinion that turkey poults get sick and die from the slightest breath of wind, but adult birds are practically not susceptible to diseases. Because of this opinion, turkey owners often become confused, not understanding what the adult turkeys in their backyard are sick with.

In fact, the picture is somewhat different. Diseases of turkeys are often common with chicken diseases. For example, Newcastle disease and influenza (fowl plague) affect both chickens and turkeys. Therefore, disease prevention measures are often the same. If the owner of the farmstead has a mixed livestock on the farm, then you need to be doubly careful.Birds can infect each other.

Common infectious diseases often affect not only birds, but also mammals.

These diseases include: salmonellosis, smallpox, leptospirosis, pasteurellosis, colibacillosis.

A fairly long list of turkey diseases can be seen in the video of a turkey breeding seminar held in 2014.

Non-contagious diseases of turkeys occupy a very insignificant place in the general list, but are often the main problem of keeping turkeys, since with a certain amount of caution and prevention, infection can not be brought into the farm, and feeding the bird depends solely on the knowledge and beliefs of the owner.

Many owners feed turkeys with whole grains, as the most natural and natural food, which “does not contain antibiotics,” which, according to many, are added to the feed by the manufacturer.

The result of a turkey eating whole grains can be a so-called hard goiter.

Hard crop in turkeys

This usually happens if the bird has been starving for a long time and after the hunger strike eats food too greedily. After feeding, the turkeys go to drink. Whole grains accumulated in the crop swell from water, swell the crop and clog the esophagus. The lack of stones or shells for grinding grain can only affect the stomach. In this case, the root cause of a hard goiter is a blockage of the intestines at the exit from the stomach.

This does not happen when feeding turkeys with factory-made compound feed, since when water gets on the feed, the latter immediately soaks into a pulp, for the assimilation of which even pebbles are not needed. If the turkey drinks enough water, the mush becomes liquid.

Theoretically, a turkey's crop can be opened surgically and the swollen grain removed.But this procedure must be carried out by a veterinarian, and therefore it is usually more profitable to slaughter turkeys than to treat them.

Symptoms of a hard goiter

Apathy. When palpated, the goiter is hard and tightly packed. Turkeys refuse to feed. There is exhaustion and a decrease in egg production in turkeys if the disease develops during the laying season. Due to the pressure of the crop on the trachea, turkeys have difficulty breathing, which subsequently leads to death from suffocation.

Treatment of hard goiter

When clogged, the turkeys' crops are opened and their contents are surgically removed. After this, Vaseline oil or sunflower oil is injected into the bird’s crop. After massaging the crop, the contents of the crop are removed, essentially squeezed out through the esophagus.

Important! To prevent the disease with hard goiter, turkeys need to be fed regularly, without allowing long breaks; it is better not to use whole, easily swelling grains in the diet of turkeys.

Swollen goiter

External signs are almost the same as with a hard goiter. The goiter is unnaturally large in size, but soft to the touch.

It is believed that this can happen if a turkey drinks too much water in the heat. In fact, it’s unlikely, unless you make him thirsty in the sun all day. If water is freely available to the bird, then turkeys drink as much as they need and little by little. In addition, water can be absorbed into the tissue through the mucous membrane of the goiter.

In fact, this is goiter catarrh or inflammation of the goiter caused by poor-quality feed in the turkey’s diet. Goiter disease develops when turkeys are fed rotten feed of animal origin, moldy grain, or if the bird has reached mineral fertilizers. The goiter can also become inflamed when a turkey swallows a foreign object.

Important! Contrary to popular belief that birds can be fed bread, this product is dangerous for all types of birds, including turkeys.

Bread can be the cause of a large but soft goiter in a turkey, since the bread can form a sticky mass that clogs the intestines and begins fermentation.

Symptoms of a soft goiter

The turkey's condition is depressed, often the appetite is reduced or completely absent. The bird's crop is soft, often filled with fermentation products of low-quality feed. When you press on the crop, you can feel a sour smell coming from the turkey's beak.

Prevention and treatment of soft goiter

If the crop is opened, the bird is given a solution of potassium permanganate instead of water on the first day. Antimicrobial drugs and mucous decoctions are also used.

Rickets in turkey poults

Turkey poults of heavy crosses get sick more often, since they require a significant amount of calcium and protein for growth. But turkey poults of egg breeds are also susceptible to this disease. Even if turkey poults have enough calcium in their diet, it will not be absorbed without vitamin D₃. And if there is an excess of phosphorus, calcium will begin to be washed out of the bones of turkey poults, which will lead to osteoporosis. Just adding vitamins to the diet of turkey poults does not do much, since for the normal absorption of this vitamin the animals also need movement. If turkey poults suddenly become lethargic, a long walk in the fresh air can help. You just need to equip a shelter from the sun where the turkey poults can hide in case of need.

Adult turkeys are relatively inactive, but even they need at least 20 m² per head for normal production of offspring. Turkey poults are even more mobile and die without movement. Which, by the way, explains the belief that turkey poults are very gentle creatures that die from drafts.Owners, raising turkeys at home, keep turkey poults in very cramped quarters.

Pecking and cannibalism in turkeys

The second consequence of keeping turkeys too crowded and the birds not being physically active is stress. Their visible signs are often self-pecking, fighting and cannibalism. It is believed that this occurs due to vitamin deficiencies, lack of animal protein or minerals. In fact, both self-pecking and cannibalism, expressed in the slaughter of fellow birds, are an external manifestation of the stress turkeys experience.

Vitamin deficiencies do not manifest themselves in self-pecking, these are the consequences of stress.

Vitamin deficiencies in turkeys

With hypovitaminosis, the formation of feathers is disrupted, the eyes often become watery and the eyelids swell, and a perversion of appetite may occur. Egg pecking often occurs not due to vitamin deficiencies, but when there is a lack of calcium, protein or feed sulfur in the birds’ diet.

Important! There is no need to starve laying turkeys, since even with a normal diet, they can peck and eat eggs from hunger. It will be impossible to stop the birds once they have tasted the contents of the egg.

Theoretically, you can add food of animal origin to the birds’ diet and see what happens. But when breeding heavy turkey crosses, it is better to use ready-made feed intended for them, rather than improvise.

If you adhere to the methods of raising turkeys developed by specialists, then most non-contagious diseases caused by an incorrectly formulated diet can be avoided.

The situation is worse with infectious diseases of turkeys. Many turkey diseases caused by viruses or microorganisms cannot be treated. The bird has to be slaughtered.However, some of these diseases can be brought into the farm in hatching eggs.

It is precisely because the eggs themselves are often contaminated that there is a high mortality rate of chickens, turkey poults, pheasants and other chickens in the first days after hatching.

What does a sick turkey look like?

Measures to prevent infectious diseases

Measures to prevent infectious diseases in turkeys are the same as the prevention of these diseases in other birds: purchase turkey poults and eggs for incubation only from prosperous farms.

As with chickens, there is usually no treatment for infectious diseases in turkeys, so it is easier to prevent the disease than to try to treat it at home.

To prevent the introduction of infection into the farm, in addition to strict quarantine measures and purchasing material for breeding turkeys only from safe sellers, internal sanitary measures must be observed: regular disinfection of premises and equipment, regular change of bedding, regular prevention of helminthiasis and coccidiosis.

Important! Some viruses can remain active in deep litter for a long time, getting there with contaminated feed or animal excrement. This is especially true for viruses common to all types of domestic animals.

Infectious diseases of turkeys with descriptions and photos

One of the rather unpleasant diseases that affects not only birds, but also mammals is smallpox, which has several types, trends and forms.

Smallpox

Smallpox is caused not by one virus, but by several different species and genera belonging to the same family. There are three separate varieties: cow pox, sheep pox and bird pox.

The group of viruses that cause bird pox includes three types of pathogens that affect different families of birds: chicken pox, pigeon pox and canary pox.

Turkey owners are only interested in chicken pox, which also affects other members of the pheasant family.

Symptoms of chickenpox

The incubation period for smallpox in birds can last from a week to 20 days. The disease manifests itself in birds in 4 forms: diphtheroid, cutaneous, catarrhal and mixed.

Diphtheroid form of the disease. Rash on the mucous membranes of the respiratory system in the form of films, wheezing, open beak.

Skin form of the disease. Pockmarks on the head.

Catarrhal form of the disease. Conjunctivitis, sinusitis, rhinitis.

Mixed form of the disease. Pockmarks on the scalp and diphtheroid films on the oral mucosa.

Fatal outcomes from fowl pox reach 60%.

When diagnosing, fowlpox must be distinguished from vitamin A deficiency, candidiasis, aspergillosis, turkey sinusitis, and respiratory mycoplasmosis, the symptoms of which are very similar.

Unlike many specific bird diseases, smallpox can be cured.

How to treat bird pox

In birds, symptomatic treatment is carried out, cleaning and disinfecting pockmarks from secondary infection. The birds' diet is enriched with vitamin A or carotene. They give an increased dose of vitamins. Antibiotics are added to poultry feed. For prevention, turkeys are vaccinated with a dry embryovirus vaccine.

Respiratory mycoplasmosis

Also called turkey sinusitis and air sac disease. A chronic disease characterized by respiratory damage, decreased productivity, sinusitis, loss of sensation and exhaustion.

Symptoms of PM

In turkeys, the incubation period of the disease lasts from a couple of days to two weeks.Turkey poults become ill at the age of 3–6 weeks, and adult birds during egg laying. The virus remains in the yolk of the egg throughout the incubation period, so there is an increased mortality of embryos and turkey poults in the first day after hatching.

Respiratory mycoplasmosis has three courses of the disease: acute, chronic and mixed.

The acute course of the disease is more often observed in turkey poults. Symptoms of the acute course of the disease: the first stage – loss of appetite, sinusitis, tracheitis; the second stage - cough, shortness of breath, catarrhal rhinitis passes into the serous-fibrous stage, some turkey poults develop conjunctivitis, growth stops, in adult birds exhaustion and decreased egg production appear. In the acute course of the disease, the mortality rate in turkey poults reaches 25%.

In the chronic course of the disease, symptoms include rhinitis and exhaustion. In birds, liquid accumulates in the throat, which adult turkeys try to get rid of.

In turkeys, the eyeball protrudes and atrophies, the joints and tendon sheaths become inflamed, and wheezing appears. In a chronic course, up to 8% of adult birds and up to 25% of turkey poults die.

Treatment and prevention of the disease

There is no treatment developed for respiratory mycoplasmosis. Broad-spectrum antibiotics are used according to the regimens specified in the instructions. Antibiotics are not used for obviously sick turkeys, but for the entire group of birds at once.

Antibiotics are not used for sick birds, since during an outbreak of the disease, sick turkeys are destroyed. A supposedly healthy bird is treated with antibiotics and left for meat and edible eggs.

Attention! Hatching eggs cannot be obtained from turkeys from a farm with respiratory mycoplasmosis.

The premises and equipment are disinfected, bird droppings are calcined at high temperatures. Quarantine is removed from the farm only after all relatively healthy birds have been slaughtered, and there has not been a single case of disease among the broodstock of turkeys and turkey poults raised up to 8 months.

Pullorosis

Aka “white diarrhea”. It is believed to be a disease of young animals. In fact, there are two variants of the disease: “child” and “adult”. Their symptoms differ beyond recognition of the disease, so people often believe that white diarrhea in turkey poults and problems with the reproductive system of turkeys are different diseases and there is nothing in common between them.

In turkey poults, pullorosis causes septicemia, colloquially “blood poisoning,” damage to the gastrointestinal tract and respiratory system. In an adult bird there is inflammation of the ovaries, oviduct and vitelline peritonitis.

Symptoms of the “children’s” version of pullorosis

Pullorosis in turkey poults is divided into two types: congenital and postnatal. With congenital turkey poults are hatched from already infected eggs, with postnatal poults they become infected when sick and healthy turkey poults are reared together.

Congenital pullorosis. The incubation period is usually 3 to 5 days. Sometimes it can reach up to 10. Main symptoms:

refusal of food;
weakness;
drooping wings;
ruffled feather;
poor plumage;
the yolk is not drawn into the abdominal cavity (in these cases, turkey poults usually do not live longer than 1 day);
droppings are white, liquid (white diarrhea);
Due to the liquid droppings, the fluff around the cloaca is glued together with excrement.

In postnatal pullorosis, three courses of the disease are distinguished: acute, subacute and chronic. The incubation period for this form is 2-5 days after hatching of turkey poults from eggs.

Symptoms of postnatal pullorosis in turkey poults during the acute course of the disease:

indigestion;
weakness;
breathing through an open beak rather than through the nasal openings;
white mucus instead of droppings;
blockage of the cloacal opening with feces glued together;
turkey poults stand with their paws spread and their eyes closed.

Subacute and chronic course of the disease occurs in turkey poults 15-20 days of age:

poor feathering;
developmental delay;
diarrhea;
broilers have inflammation of the leg joints.

The mortality rate for subacute and chronic pullorosis in turkey poults is low.

Symptoms of “adult” pullorosis

In adult turkeys, pullorosis occurs in an asymptomatic form. Periodically, a decrease in egg production, vitelline peritonitis, inflammation of the ovaries and oviduct, and intestinal disorders are observed.

Treatment of the disease

Apparently sick turkeys are destroyed. Conditionally healthy birds are treated with antibacterial drugs, using them according to the regimen prescribed by the veterinarian or indicated in the annotation for the drug.

Important! For preventive purposes, broiler turkey poults are given furazolidone from the first day until almost slaughter.

Prevention of pullorosis

Compliance with veterinary requirements for incubating eggs and keeping and feeding turkeys. A ban on the export and sale of products from farms infected with pullorosis.

Possible problems that owners of broiler turkey poults may encounter

Diseases of turkey poults of heavy broiler crosses often consist of ordinary rickets, when the bones cannot keep up with the rapidly growing muscle mass.If the owner wants to grow such turkey poults up to 6 months, having received a turkey weighing about 10 kg, he will have to use industrial technologies for growing broiler turkey poults using furazolidone, coccidiostats and feed for broiler turkeys with a growth stimulant.

The phrase “growth stimulator” that scares many people is actually a correctly selected formula of vitamins and minerals that a turkey needs for proper development, and not mythical steroids.

If the owner prefers to raise such crosses of broiler turkeys on his own feed, he will have to slaughter them at 2 months, since after this period a large percentage of turkey poults will begin to “fall on their feet” due to an improperly balanced diet.

To avoid diseases of broiler cross turkeys, you will have to use developments for industrial poultry farms.

You can see how to feed heavy cross-breed turkey poults in this video.

There are no specific infectious diseases in turkey poults. Turkeys of all ages suffer from infectious diseases. But turkey poults are more susceptible to infections and require special attention.