Poultry diagnostic laboratories are located throughout Florida to assist in the diagnosis of poultry diseases (see A Guide to Commercial Poultry Production in Florida). A brief description of the more common diseases is provided to familiarize county Extension personnel with these diseases.
Cause: A protozoan parasite. Chiefly a disease of turkeys but it also
can be a problem in chickens, waterfowls, quails, and other birds.
Symptoms: General weakness, unthriftiness, sulfur colored droppings.
Characteristic lesions are round, yellow ulcer-like depressed areas on the
liver and enlarged, thickened, and distended ulcerated ceca filled with a
thick cheesy mass. Mortality may be high.
Treatment: Ipropran in feed.
Control: Good management and sanitation. Keep turkeys away from chickens.
Cause: A protozoan parasite, coccidiosis infect the intestine and
ceca or blind pouches. Several species are recognized and are site specific
within the intestine. Spread in contaminated feed and water, by introducing
infected chickens to the flock, by people or contaminated equipment introducing
the organism. Coccidia must sporulate to become infective. Under optimum
conditions of moisture, temperature and oxygen they sporulate and become
infective for the next chicken.
Symptoms: The main symptom of coccidiosis is diarrhea. Acute intestinal
coccidiosis results in unthriftiness, diarrhea and considerable mortality.
In chronic coccidiosis. nutritional deficiencies and secondary conditions
often develop.
Treatment: Many drugs are available.
Control: Use of a coccidiostat in the feed. Good management and
sanitation. Raising and growing chickens on wire.
* From Diseases of Poultry, a paper by Dr. Gary D. Butcher, DVM, PhD., Poultry Veterinarian, College of Veterinary Medicine, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, University of Florida, Gainesville. From publication PS-5, Florida Cooperative Extension Service. .