What to do If Your Chicken Develops Frostbite
First, a little back story…
Sometimes, despite doing all we can to prevent it, frostbite happens anyway. The rooster in the photos is our boy, Lucky. He is especially prone to frostbite and, so far, everything we’ve done to prevent it hasn’t been enough. His comb isn’t overly large, no larger than some of our other roosters who don’t have any problems. It doesn’t even have to be cold enough that you’d worry about frostbite, he’ll still get it. Last winter, when we learned this, we put heat in his coop and kept it above the freezing point in there until spring. I think he has poor circulation to his comb and that’s why he gets frostbite so easily. It’s the only thing that makes sense to me at this point.
It kills me to see him suffer so we’ve been heating his coop most of the winter this year. In early February we got a cold snap that proved to be too much even with the heater and the poor guy has frostbite again. Again, everyone else made out fine. Lucky has a draft free coop that’s cleaned every day. There is no water kept in there overnight. The humidity is low. He even has a heater. We did all of the “right” things but it still wasn’t enough. Next year his coop is going to have a new window on the sunny side so the sun can heat the coop more effectively as well as insulation to help hold that heat in there better. With any luck, this will be the last time this poor guy has to deal with this.
If you have not experienced frostbite in your flock, I hope you never do. If, unfortunately, that isn’t the case and one of your chickens ends up affected, I hope this post and these pictures will help you deal with it. It’s not easy to share the parts of chicken tending that make you feel like a failure (and this situation absolutely does make me feel I have failed Lucky) but I believe it’s more important to share the information in the hopes that it will help someone else than it is to hide it to protect my feelings.
So, What Does Frostbite Look Like?
These pictures below show the progression of Lucky’s frostbite starting with the morning I discovered it. At the time I am writing this post he is still healing so I will come back and update this post as time goes on. Frostbite takes a LONG time to heal.
The first picture is of the morning I discovered the frostbite. His comb looks purple in the damaged areas. There is no swelling and no blisters at this point, just the purple coloration.
The second is three days later. By this time Lucky had substantial swelling in his comb, mostly at the back of his head. His comb swelled enough that the skin split and he was bleeding from multiple places. He also had developed blisters at this point. You can see crusty bits on his comb where blisters have popped and, if you look closely, you can see intact blisters at the back of his comb. You can also see a line of white/pink tissue directly below the black. This area was damaged too, just not as severely as the top parts of his comb. If you see one of your chickens with a comb or wattles that looks this light pink/white color on the tips/edges, you’re likely seeing the very earliest stages of frostbite. If you get them in out of the cold at this point, it will likely heal completely without progressing the the point Lucky has. Unfortunately for Lucky, he hit this early frostbite stage overnight while we were all sleeping and he was already too far gone in the morning to fully reverse it. This stage looks horrible and it is, indeed, painful for the chicken but it’s part of the normal healing process and things are going as expected.
The third picture is ten days later. The swelling has subsided completely and so have the blisters. You can still see some crusty bits on the back of his comb from the blisters.
The fourth picture is day fifteen. His comb is starting to show improvement at this point. The front of his comb is mostly healed with no tissue loss and the back of his comb has healed quite a bit as well. He has several points on his comb that look as though they are not going to heal completely and he will likely have some tissue loss there but it’s not looking as bad as I initially feared. Temperatures were way above freezing on this day so he was enjoying being out in the fresh air.
What Do I Do if my Chicken gets Frostbite on their Comb or Wattles?
First, I’m not a veterinarian, I’m just sharing what I have learned and what has worked for us. Use my advice at your discretion and please consult a vet if you are unsure.
If your chicken gets frostbite and is already at the purple stage (as shown in Lucky’s day one picture), there’s honestly not much you can do at this point. Your chicken will need to be kept warm enough to prevent re-freezing of the frostbitten tissue until it has healed. Warm them slowly though, don’t point a heater or hair dryer at the frostbitten tissue as rapid heating can cause more damage. Your chicken will go through the healing process as shown in the pictures above and your job, aside from keeping them warm, is to monitor for infection. There will likely be breaks in the skin and chickens aren’t the best at keeping a sterile environment so infection is a real possibility.
Your chicken will be in pain as they heal. You can (and probably should) offer pain medication as needed. Lucky was on regular pain medication for about the first week before he started refusing it. I’m not going to list medications or dosages here as I am not a vet but you should know that there are common over-the-counter pain medications that you can use. Your veterinarian can also supply you with chicken specific pain relief.
As your chicken heals, don’t touch the frostbitten areas. Don’t put anything on them that you have to rub in – not Vaseline or dog paw balm or anything else. Don’t try to remove the frostbitten parts either. Just keep your chicken warm and comfortable and let their body do the work to heal them. You can use a wound spray to help prevent infection if you’d like but make sure the spray is fully dried before they’re exposed to colder temperatures. You don’t want to send them out wet. Don’t use any sprays or products with alcohol in them, it will be incredibly painful for the chicken.
At some point the most damaged areas (the black parts) will die and fall off. The black areas can get smaller as the chicken heals so don’t assume that everything that is initially purple/black is doomed to fall off. Sometimes it’ll all die in more severe cases but in mild cases or even moderate ones like Lucky’s you’ll probably see the amount of affected tissue decrease some as they heal.
It will take weeks in milder cases and months in more severe cases for the frostbite to heal completely. I expect it will be spring here (April/May) before Lucky is healed.
How Can I Prevent Frostbite?
Frostbite usually happens in cold, drafty and damp conditions. To prevent it happening to your flock, make sure their coop is not drafty. It needs to have ventilation at the top to allow moisture to leave but there should never be a breeze blowing on the birds. Go into and close the coop on a windy day to make sure there are no drafts.
Keep your water outside of the coop as much as possible. Some days chickens don’t want to go outside and you may need to have water in the coop so that they can actually drink it. If this is the case, dump that water out or move it back to the run at bedtime. They won’t be drinking water overnight and it’ll get the extra humidity out of the coop while they sleep.
Another way to cut down on the humidity is to clean the coop daily. Chicken poop is full of moisture and, if allowed to build up, can make for a humid coop.
Make sure that your coop is large enough for the number of chickens living in it. Too many chickens in too small of a coop will mean extra humidity. Make sure that there is enough roost space for everyone as well so that no one is left alone on the floor overnight without someone to snuggle with for warmth.
To prevent frostbitten wattles, use a waterer that doesn’t allow the chickens to dip their wattles in the water when they drink. If you have to use and open bowl, raise it so that the birds reach over the edge a bit and it’ll help keep their wattles out of the water. Just make sure the shortest chicken in the coop can still reach the water! If chickens are foraging in the snow this can also cause frostbite on the wattles in the same way that dipping them into the water when they drink will.
If it’s going to be REALLY cold or the windchill is going to make it feel really cold, keep the chickens in their coop for the day to help keep them warmer and out of the wind. They may not like being stuck indoors but sometimes it’s the best option. I have found that roosters, especially, are likely to stay outside and watch over their hens even when they’re cold and want to be indoors. In a flock there is often at least one hen outside at any given time and sometimes the rooster will stay out all day as the hens come and go from the coop. Roosters tend to have larger combs and wattles than hens do as well so they’re already at higher risk without their self-sacrificing behaviour. Sometimes not opening the coop door in the morning is the best option.
Heating your coop enough to keep it around the freezing mark is also helpful even though most people will recommend against heat regardless of the situation. I’m obviously not one of those anti-heat people. You don’t want it to be hot in the coop, just warm enough to take the edge off when it’s way below freezing. If it’s too warm in the coop you could cause more problems than you’ll solve. A radiant panel heater is a good option for giving the birds a place to warm up. It’s also considered the safest heating option for a coop.
Sometimes, though, you can do all of these things and it’s still not enough. Lucky’s coop had a panel heater when he got frostbite this year. His coop isn’t drafty, is cleaned every morning, is appropriately sized, doesn’t have water in it at night and the humidity is low. Still he has frostbite. I’ve since added a heat lamp housing (mounted solid to the ceiling) above where he roosts and I’m using a 100 watt ceramic heat emitter bulb in it to keep his comb warm while he sleeps. This has worked much better for him but it is considered less safe. To mitigate risk, someone is always home when the heat is on (which means I haven’t gone anywhere with my husband in a few weeks now) and there is a smoke detector in the coop that will sound in our house 24/7. I clean the lamp/bulb and check to make sure the bulb is screwed in tight daily.
Around the internet there are lots of places where you will find folks saying to put Vaseline, lanolin, coconut oil, or a paw balm for dogs (like Musher’s Secret) on combs and wattles to prevent frostbite. I have not found these things to be effective. The idea is that they provide a barrier to keep moisture off the comb and wattles and that is supposed to prevent frostbite. The issue is that the products only work until they’re absorbed into the skin. Some of them absorb fairly quickly and, once they’re absorbed, they’re not doing anything besides moisturizing the comb/wattles. In the case of Vaseline I’ve learned that it can actually be a detriment to use it as the Vaseline itself will freeze and actually can cause frostbite. If you’re going to use something on their combs/wattles I’d definitely skip the Vaseline as well as anything water-based.
Feet and Toes Are at Risk Too
It’s not something I have had to deal with (thankfully) so I haven’t covered it in my post but toes and feet are also at risk for frostbite – not just combs and wattles. Wide, flat roosts to hunker down on at night and areas that aren’t covered in ice and snow to stand on during the day will help prevent frostbite on the feet and toes.
Hopefully This Helps
I hope you will never need to deal with frostbite but, if you do, hopefully this post helps you. If you have any questions please feel free to reach out. I have, unfortunately, had to deal with frostbite more than I’d like thanks to Lucky and that has forced me to learn. If I can help, I will.
