Chicken can't stand or walk, paralyzed??

[jmendoza]

Just so you know, we had the same thing happen to one of our hens, and initially I inverter her and drained her crop, which was sour, ans she recovered, or so I thought, as she began laying again.
About 4 weeks later we found her on her side, unable to walk, head down, much like yours. Draining the crop did nothing and she was not eating or drinking so I used an eyedropper to give her water. She would eat worms if we put them in her mouth, but was losing weight fast.
I was able to get some diluted yogurt down her throat with the eyedropper, and went to see a chicken doctor who gave me two Chlorampheticol capsules and told me to give her one and see if she reacted. The next day she was up and walking, but would fall over. She began eating and we gave her the second pill ( used a short straw with the pill in the end to insert it into her esophagus). By the next day she was running around, but still stumbled occasionally. The vet said she had a digestive infection, and that if the Chlorampheticol did not cure it with two pills, there was nothing else he do for her. At one point, before being sick, she was the smallest and the runt, but now, she has put on weight and rules the roost.

She now jumps on my shoulder due to all the personal attention she got from me while I hand nursed her back to health, and follows me everywhere. Little Lois will never forget we saved her life and shows us both extra affection for so doing.

 

[Gotalotofpetstoo]

I'm going to ask a question that may seem silly to some of you, but I keep reading things about the chickens, egg shells being soft. I personally have always bought my eggs from the grocery store. When I stay at my mother's I do eat the eggs from her chickens. But to be honest I prefer store bought because they don't have in my opinion as strong of an egg taste. What I have noticed is that with my mother's fresh eggs, the shells break very easily compared to store-bought eggs. I've actually broke some of her eggs just carrying them into the house. So is it normal for fresh eggs to break more easily than store bought eggs? Or is there something going on that I need to look into for my mother?

 

[Gotalotofpetstoo]

Just so you know, we had the same thing happen to one of our hens, and initially I inverter her and drained her crop, which was sour, ans she recovered, or so I thought, as she began laying again.
About 4 weeks later we found her on her side, unable to walk, head down, much like yours. Draining the crop did nothing and she was not eating or drinking so I used an eyedropper to give her water. She would eat worms if we put them in her mouth, but was losing weight fast.
I was able to get some diluted yogurt down her throat with the eyedropper, and went to see a chicken doctor who gave me two Chlorampheticol capsules and told me to give her one and see if she reacted. The next day she was up and walking, but would fall over. She began eating and we gave her the second pill ( used a short straw with the pill in the end to insert it into her esophagus). By the next day she was running around, but still stumbled occasionally. The vet said she had a digestive infection, and that if the Chlorampheticol did not cure it with two pills, there was nothing else he do for her. At one point, before being sick, she was the smallest and the runt, but now, she has put on weight and rules the roost.

She now jumps on my shoulder due to all the personal attention she got from me while I hand nursed her back to health, and follows me everywhere. Little Lois will never forget we saved her life and shows us both extra affection for so doing.

Thank you for sharing that. So do you think that her illness was brought on strictly from a digestive issue and that the two pills you gave her fixed that problem? Or do you think there was something else involved?

 

[azygous]

Eggs from a backyard flock are indeed different from store bought. The hens in commercial flocks are no more than two years old, so their shells are sturdy since they have young bodies. Also, eggs are sorted and eggs with flaws are rejected and often sold to food processors.

Backyard flocks often include laying hens that are older, and as hens age, their shell glands sometimes don't muster the amount of calcium to build strong shells.

As for backyard chicken eggs tasting "stronger", yes, they do, because they are fresh. By the time you buy store bought eggs, they can be two months old. The taste can also reflect the variety of things a free range chicken will eat, and those things can add to the taste.

 

[Gotalotofpetstoo]

So, we leave Ethel's crate open at night so she can get out if she wants to. Sometime in the early hours this morning she made her way out of the crate. She did stumble a bit getting out but look how tall she is standing when she gets out. Her elbows are not on the ground.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/Rf41upyhuwVcc5fr9

 

[azygous]

Google is not a nice place. They make you join up in order to view photos. They are Nazis. You can post your photos directly here by clicking on the paper clip in the reply window. That opens your files on your computer. You select the file where you keep your photos and then select the ones you wish to post. Then click "open". That in turn automatically pastes them here. Then select "full image" and then "post".

Great news that Ethel is gaining strength! This steady improvement

 

[jmendoza]

Yeah! Good for your little hen,
I saw your post and followed it because like you, as I posted above, our Lois has a very similar condition that took weeks for her to recover from. We had to isolate our Lois while she recovered so her sisters would not attack her. Ethel will show her appreciation, hens are smart and understand love, and she will now think you are the rooster..

One thing about poultry is that the medicine, and diagnosis is more geared towards large flocks and commercial operations. This means they are more worried about losing the entire flock to a highly contagious disease, or unhealthful conditions. Thus the medicine is not focused on remedies for just one hen because that would not be practical for a commercial operation. The norm is to isolate the hen, and usually put it down humanely, chicken dinner! So it is not surprising to have a miss diagnosis, especially when it is a condition that only affects one hen. What does surprise me is that the vet who saw your Ethel did not at least throw a hail Mary pass and give her an antibiotic before giving her a death sentence.

Your hens will have thin shells that break really easily if the calcium content of the feed is not ample enough. Most feeds have finely ground oyster shell passes through them very quickly so they don't absorb as much. Purina sells coarse ground oyster shell which we add to their feed, and put in one of the chick feeders too for them to peck at. It stays in their crop and acts like grit, but also dissolves slowly so they get plenty of calcium and nice thick shells.

 

[Gotalotofpetstoo]

Google is not a nice place. They make you join up in order to view photos. They are Nazis. You can post your photos directly here by clicking on the paper clip in the reply window. That opens your files on your computer. You select the file where you keep your photos and then select the ones you wish to post. Then click "open". That in turn automatically pastes them here. Then select "full image" and then "post".

Great news that Ethel is gaining strength! This steady improvement

Thank you for that information. I had the hardest time figuring out how to get a link for others to be able to watch them. I tried doing it on my photo bucket account but couldn't figure that out since I haven't used it in years and accidentally stumbled across it on Google. And I sure didn't realize they make you sign up for an account just to view videos. That's ridiculous. I will definitely try your suggestion on my next video. And thank you again

 

[azygous]

My instruction was for posting photos. Videos are even easier. But it involves YouTube. You, not we, need to open an account and post your video there. Then copy the URL and paste it here, and your video embeds slick as anything.

 

[Gotalotofpetstoo]

So this question is sort of related to Ethel but not directly. Ethel will live the rest of her life, long or short, up here with us, especially since I'm pretty much positive she is blind. Blind. Question is, because she is still alive. We do not have confirmation if she has Marek's or not, and because my mother's chickens are getting older, she wants to get some new chicks. She did find a farm in forest city that has chicks that have been vaccinated for Marek's. So with them having been vaccinated and not knowing Ethel's status with that, would being vaccinated make it safe to put the new chicks in with Ethel? And would that even be a good idea, her being blind? My mom does not want to put them down with her other old and bigger chickens in the chicken coop because they will too small and could get out so she wants to bring them up here if it would be okay with Ethel until they are old enough to turn out with the other bigger chickens. I don't recall what breeds he has, all I remember she said RIR's.
Any thoughts on adding some baby's in with Ethel and what the best breed would be for her to get if she gets them from him?