broken leg

[palomero55]

Hello to All! I am new on this forum but I have a not so new question. I had a young bird return after the team with a broken leg. The fracture is in the mid leg, (tib-fib) area. My question is, should I splint only that area or should I extend the splint to the foot? The injury is now about 10 days old. I kept the bird in isolation without a splint for 3 days to allow for swelling before splinting only the fractured area. I felt it would be easier for the bird to lie down if the lower leg was allowed to dangle. The bird gets along well in the loft, perching, eating, drinking, but is reluctant to leave at exercise time. It appears the bird is now trying to put pressure on the the leg as it moves about but is not able to. Should I splint the mid and lower leg with a slight bend or straight or leave well enough alone? Thanks for your help in advance!

[AZWhitefeather]

Hello & Welcome to pigeons.com,
I'm sorry to hear about the injury your pigeon has sustained.

With the injury being 10 days old I'm not sure how the 'experts' on the site would approach the situation, however Terry, another Moderator, lives in your area & she will be able to better assist you.

I did, however want to acknowledge your post & welcome you.

Help will be on the way shortly.
Cindy

[e0emouse]

Hi,

The leg definitely needs to be splinted as soon as possible. Every time that fracture is moved, the bird is experiencing terrific pain until the bone starts knitting together (which it may have already done, if it has been stable at all for the last week). I understand your initial desire to not splint with the swelling, but you should always provide support to a broken bone, even if the wrap has to be redone later when the swelling subsides. For a lower leg fracture, you can tape the leg in a natural position. Take several layers of wide adhesive tape and stick them together (maybe 3 or 4 2" wide by 4" long pieces) -- do this twice. Put the bird's leg in a normal position, and apply one of the tape segments made above on the inside of the leg from just above the foot to as high as you can go on the leg with the tape while still allowing the bird to stand. Put the other tape segment on the other side of the leg and press together as firmly against the leg as you can all the way down. This should support the bird enough that he can comfortably stand on it. You can trim a little of the excess, but leave good margins for support of the leg. Leave the tape on for two weeks, but check to make sure that the foot is not too cold or swollen. It is imperative that you get good placement of the leg as it will heal how ever you splint it!

Good luck!

[Trees Gray]

Hello and Welcome to Pigeons.com

The information you have received is excellent.

I only want to add that you can help the bone to start knitting together better and quicker, once he is in the splint, by giving 3 tablets of Symphytum 6X, homeopathic medicine for 3 days. This sets up healing quickly. My rehabber and I use it all the time it works wonders!

You can purchase this at your local health food store.


Treesa

[palomero55]

Thanks for the help. I will change the splint to include the lower leg, also the material (I used popsicle sticks cut to fit just the middle leg) to the adhesive tape. Thanks again for the excellent advice!

Originally posted by e0emouse:
Hi,

The leg definitely needs to be splinted as soon as possible. Every time that fracture is moved, the bird is experiencing terrific pain until the bone starts knitting together (which it may have already done, if it has been stable at all for the last week). I understand your initial desire to not splint with the swelling, but you should always provide support to a broken bone, even if the wrap has to be redone later when the swelling subsides. For a lower leg fracture, you can tape the leg in a natural position. Take several layers of wide adhesive tape and stick them together (maybe 3 or 4 2" wide by 4" long pieces) -- do this twice. Put the bird's leg in a normal position, and apply one of the tape segments made above on the inside of the leg from just above the foot to as high as you can go on the leg with the tape while still allowing the bird to stand. Put the other tape segment on the other side of the leg and press together as firmly against the leg as you can all the way down. This should support the bird enough that he can comfortably stand on it. You can trim a little of the excess, but leave good margins for support of the leg. Leave the tape on for two weeks, but check to make sure that the foot is not too cold or swollen. It is imperative that you get good placement of the leg as it will heal how ever you splint it!

Good luck!

[palomero55]

Thanks to all for the great welcome and terrific advice! I am sure I will be able to use this information over and over. This is my first year with breeding and training racing pigeons. They are amazing birds and watching them fly is incredible and I am surprised I havn't had more casualties. My past experience (7 years currently and 3 years as a boy) has been with West of England Tumblers, they are much less nerve racking to watch fly. Hope to be of some help to the group. This is a great site!

[AliBlack]

Hi Kimberley, the break is in the upper leg tib/fib rather than lower leg, for a lower leg fracture do you splint from just above the foot to just below the hock/ankle joint, or are you taping the whole leg up to the stifle joint?
And if the break's in the tib/fib, tape all the way down too, or just tape from stifle joint to hock joint?!

Alison

Originally posted by e0emouse:
Hi,

The leg definitely needs to be splinted as soon as possible. Every time that fracture is moved, the bird is experiencing terrific pain until the bone starts knitting together (which it may have already done, if it has been stable at all for the last week). I understand your initial desire to not splint with the swelling, but you should always provide support to a broken bone, even if the wrap has to be redone later when the swelling subsides. For a lower leg fracture, you can tape the leg in a natural position. Take several layers of wide adhesive tape and stick them together (maybe 3 or 4 2" wide by 4" long pieces) -- do this twice. Put the bird's leg in a normal position, and apply one of the tape segments made above on the inside of the leg from just above the foot to as high as you can go on the leg with the tape while still allowing the bird to stand. Put the other tape segment on the other side of the leg and press together as firmly against the leg as you can all the way down. This should support the bird enough that he can comfortably stand on it. You can trim a little of the excess, but leave good margins for support of the leg. Leave the tape on for two weeks, but check to make sure that the foot is not too cold or swollen. It is imperative that you get good placement of the leg as it will heal how ever you splint it!

Good luck!