Chick Dragging her leg? Updates of Negu. *New Update (7/6) Pg 5. Pictures added!*

[sunny & the 5 egg layers]

Well, I do know that birds can adapt to being one legged. Or, if you have a vet that really cares, you could get a prosthetic for her.

If she is completely unable to move her leg, she may have nerve damage.. it could very well be paralyzed.

Can she move her toes?

I do not have a good bird vet in my area. She can move her leg, and can feel it when the other chicks step on her toes. I am thinking about seperating her, the other chicks won't leave her leg alone. They step on it, peck at it, and trip over it. I just hate to see her all alone by herself.

 

[EmAbTo48]

She is better off alone trust me! Give her a stuffed animal that helps. The other birds will make her leg worse by running it over. We had a meat chick come to us like this, a roo, he was a fighter! I was for sure he had sprangled leg so we did the band aid trick he seem to drag it and it looked like he was beginning to use the leg correctly. We had the band aid on him for 3 weeks (we got him as a day old). Sadly though after I thought he looked great we took the bandaid off and with in 3 days he was dragging it again.

But he lived his life (5 month till we culled since he was a meat chicken) just fine he just dragged the leg and used a lot of wing and jumping to get around, he however needed speacial attention to his belly and keeping it dry ( I just kept the pine shavings dry all the time) since he was on it all the time. But man he would give his siblings a run for their money lol he had a lot of spunk to him he didn't take anything from anyone. He ate and drank and kept up with the rest.

But when he was a day old to 3 weeks we seperated him from the rest due to the leg, and he never stopped eating/drinking. He was slow in development in his feathers not sure why. We kept him in longer and bonded with him, I just couldn't cull him since he was thriving besides for his leg!

I think you need to splint the leg somehow to just make it stay straight and up. Popsicle sticks? And a bandaid? I am not sure. Google sprangled leg and you can see people took bandaids and wrapped up each leg fully look into ducklings to with sprangled legs they might have some different methods that will work with a chick too. I don't think this is a defect TSC wouldn't have sent one that came out like this. I think this is some type of sprangled leg going on and it happened during shippment.

 

[speckledhen]

I've been here a few times because I have one hen who will throw a percentage of her chicks as dwarfs and/or with slipped tendons and other serious hock issues. Let me try to be tactful here--after many times trying many things with several chicks with serious hock issues, we no longer try to fix them, if you get my drift. It is my considered and experienced opinion that 99% of these defects cannot be fixed. You are welcome to try, of course, but if nothing works, I don't want you to beat yourself up about it. The chick may also be in a fair amount of pain, which is sometimes hard to assess.

I have one D'Anver chick who hatched with what I believe is a slipped tendon. I'm giving it 24 hours to resolve on its own, in case it's just due to him being crammed in a tiny egg, however, if it does not, because of all our past experience with this, we will euthanize him tomorrow if he isn't up on his feet by then.

I have raised a bird who was injured as a young male and ended up with permanent tendon damage at the age of about 20 weeks old (Zane, who died suddenly about a week ago at going on 5 years old). I will not do it again. There is more to it than you realize. I do, however, wish you luck with the chick, sunny. Seems a shame for them to make it all the way to hatch, then to come into the world with a defect such as that, so I understand your desire to help.

 

[xC0000005]

Everything speckledhen says is true, but being the patron saint of lost causes myself, I'd suggest you try something a little crazy. Take a tiny plastic cup and an egg carton, and cut out a "seat" in eg carton where the legs can fit through in the right position. Put the chick down inside it and make a tiny waterer from a medicine cup, and a tiny feeder from another.

The goal here is to get the leg straight underneath her and let her put weight on it gently.
Two things should be obvious here:
#1. You will need to pay a great deal of care on positioning for heat.
#2. You will need to constantly attend to the water/heat needs. Also if the vent isn't clear pasty butt will be a constant problem.

You are probably better off following speckledhen's advice but I have been there, picking up runts and dragging half starved chickens home in the dead of winter because, well, because.

Remember that it is highly likely that your attempts will end in failure, regardless of your effort, and please, if the chick shows signs of pain (pinch the wing of one gently to hear the pain chirp) don't extend its pain to ease yours.

I've been here a few times because I have one hen who will throw a percentage of her chicks as dwarfs and/or with slipped tendons and other serious hock issues. Let me try to be tactful here--after many times trying many things with several chicks with serious hock issues, we no longer try to fix them, if you get my drift. It is my considered and experienced opinion that 99% of these defects cannot be fixed. You are welcome to try, of course, but if nothing works, I don't want you to beat yourself up about it. The chick may also be in a fair amount of pain, which is sometimes hard to assess.

I have one D'Anver chick who hatched with what I believe is a slipped tendon. I'm giving it 24 hours to resolve on its own, in case it's just due to him being crammed in a tiny egg, however, if it does not, because of all our past experience with this, we will euthanize him tomorrow if he isn't up on his feet by then.

I have raised a bird who was injured as a young male and ended up with permanent tendon damage at the age of about 20 weeks old (Zane, who died suddenly about a week ago at going on 5 years old). I will not do it again. There is more to it than you realize. I do, however, wish you luck with the chick, sunny. Seems a shame for them to make it all the way to hatch, then to come into the world with a defect such as that, so I understand your desire to help.

 

[dragonmorgan]

Did u bandaid only the bad leg or did u bandaid both legs together. Im new to chicks but it might work. Good luck and i hope the little chicks leg comes around

 

[Dingo]

I have a chick that hatched with a minor leg defect. The other chicks ended up damaging the leg even more. This was it before.

After 2 weeks of band-aid treatment it can now stand upright, it still has a limp but it's mobile. Her destination is the freezer, but I wanted her to be as close to normal as possible during her life. She has one quail friend that she's bonded with and he even feeds her(these are coturnix quail). We didn't start the band-aid treatment until she was already a week old due to how small her legs were. Here's todays pic of her. If you can find a way to get her leg under her it's worth a shot.

 

[cmfarm]

I was going to suggest the chick chair too. I think it is your best bet. You can do a search on here for "chick chair" and can find pictures and descriptions on how to do it.

 

[speckledhen]

We tried the chick chair/sling ourselves on one of the Delawares with a slipped tendon. You may be able to find the thread somewhere under "pocket pooper" (my DH kept the chick in his pocket sometimes, LOL). It didn't work, as I said in my previous post.



Here it is for you: https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/267520/dh-has-a-pocket-pooper-pics

From the thread, the chair made from a pocket cut out of a shirt and a coffee container:

 

[smilen1122]

I'm curious how things have turned out for you and the baby chick 2+ weeks later - and if any of the suggestions worked ? ?

 

[chestypuller]

good luck to your chick.