Blindness is not very common in poultry so it is something many are unlikely to encounter. However, there are cases where your chickens may get injuries in the eye, get conditions such as conjunctivitis or even go totally blind for various reasons.
The number one reason why many chickens go blind is poor ventilation. If the house is poorly ventilated, there will be an accumulation of ammonia in the poultry house and this can have a serious effect on the eyes as ammonia is an irritating gas, especially if your chickens spend most of their time indoors.
A high concentration of ammonia in the poultry house will cause ammonia burns. This will start with mild symptoms such as watery eyes and within time, it will progress into the accumulation of a solidified pus-like material in the eyes of the chickens. Eventually, this leads to a condition called keratoconjuctivitis.
To prevent this from happening, here are some simple measures that you should undertake when it comes to poultry house design:-
- Make sure the poultry house well ventilated. If you are not using the modern poultry house designs for commercial chickens, avoid covering the poultry house entirely, especially in the night. The harmful elements or gases excreted by the poultry such as carbondioxide, ammonia and dust must be taken out through an efficient ventilation system and the oxygen has to enter the poultry house through a good ventilation system.
- Ensure that the litter in the poultry house is not wet and make sure that accumulated litter is removed from the poultry house regularly. You shouldn’t leave litter in the poultry house for more than four weeks.
- Ensure that there is no water spillage on the flooring of the poultry house.
- Make sure the birds are well spaced in order to reduce overcrowding.
For the affected birds, get them a good eye ointment or even the common tetracycline eye ointments and apply on the eyes twice a day for three days. In some cases, if the intervention comes late, the chickens may not even recover as the ammonia gas will have damaged the cornea.
Other causes of blindness in chickens
Blindness in chickens can also occur due to the following reasons:-
- Physical trauma on the eye such as scratches.
- There are certain types of the Marek’s disease that cause blindness.
- Respiratory infections in the chicken’s upper respiratory tract such as sinusitis can also cause blindness.
Use the antibiotic eye drops for all kinds of eye infections.
Partial Blindness in Chicken
You are unlikely to detect partial blindness in your chickens unless you observe them closely. A chicken with partial blindness will, for example, miss the mark when pecking their food. A partial blindness will most likely be caused by trauma in the eye and will usually affect just one eye.
If the eyes seem ok but the chicken is missing the mark, it might be having a partial blindness due to a vitamin A deficiency from a poor diet. It can also be due to an underlying health problem that the chicken might be suffering from or even problems in the chicken’s digestive system such as worms or even coccidiosis. If the chicken has a vitamin A deficiency, you can mix some cod liver oil into their food rations. But don’t go overboard. Too much vitamin A can be harmful for your chickens.