Hello,
I have a thread (https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=556378&p=1) for my Cici, but here is the shorter (still long) version: I am not sure what she has. The latest avian vet said it is Merek's. But she had no paralysis! She does have weakness in the legs (at this point in her whole body) and she is now at the point where she no longer wakes up to eat or opens her eyes. We are tube feeding her, hoping that it will give her more time to concur this thing! Mainly, she has a VERY twister neck. It started with her just looking towards the left, went to completley stearing at the stars to all the way back around!!!
I noticed this on August 6th 2011.
Anyway here is her info: please let me know if there is anything that can help with twisted beck. Will the Colloidal Silver work? what about bovine colostrum? Can I combine them? How much of each? I've also, after reading this post started her on Hypericum (first dose tonight). PLEASE... ANY HELP IS APPRECIATED!!!
1) What type of bird , age and weight:
Bantam hen, at least 1 year old, 300 grams
2) What is the behavior, exactly.:
Twisted neck/star gazing, weakness , loss of balance, unable to walk, (the neck is twisting more and more, to the point that she is trying to do a 360 or tuck it under her body!) She had coccidia, but it was treated. She also has a lump low on her body between the legs ( ) <-this wide and ( ) <--this long.... but the vet said it was not something we should worry about at this point as she feels no pain from it. Also, she has not been laying, not for some time, but we thought that it was because she has been molting and was still in the process of molting when this was set on.
3) How long has the bird been exhibiting symptoms?
Approx. 1 week
4) Are other birds exhibiting the same symptoms?
N/A-we only have 1 bird
5) Is there any bleeding, injury, broken bones or other sign of trauma.:
None known- we've done a blood test and a poop test, but no x-rays (would that help? doing x-rays?)
6) What happened, if anything that you know of, that may have caused the situation.
Unknown for the most part. I did smell bleach one day near our apartment. I know the cleaning staff uses that to clean the pathways sometimes so maybe some of that may have gotten in the soil that she dug through. We told the vet this but they did not seem to give it much thought.
7) What has the bird been eating and drinking, if at all.
Shea eats and drinks with a great appetite and enthusiasm, but struggles because of the twist in her neck. She disentangles her neck when she eats and appears very normal, like there is nothing wrong, however, after some chowing down, she will "chock" on a grain and that will bring her head tumbling down. Also, water is a HUGE deal breaker. She is very thirsty and tries to drink but each little tiny sip of water makes her head go insane, I can only describe it as an ice cream headache. She lays her head down , rests for a few seconds and then she is back at trying to eat. As for WHAT she has been eating: Scratch, mealworms, layers mash, high octane (fish oil) grains...and a mix of pellets <--I try and get whatever variety is available at the feed store. As for "real" food she gets lots of lettuce and fresh corn, and every now and then maybe once a week or so she'll get grapes, strawberries, watermelon). Since she has been sick we've given her bananas, honey, scrambled eggs, baby apple sauce <---she is not a big fan of this last one. Oh we've also given her whole grain bread dipped in vitamin water, because it is a way for her to take in water without her head going crazy. I have been giving her water by syringe- placing it near her beak one tiny drop at a time. This works better when she is resting/ sleeping, she does not seem as bothered by it.
8) How does the poop look? Normal? Bloody? Runny? etc.
She has literally had them all! The bloody poop only happened twice the entire time she has been sick. They happened late at night like 2 am. Most recently she had 2 poops that were soft almost diarrhea like. (She did get tube fed at the vet today and she did get fluids as well so that may be a result of the tube feeding. (she also ate her usual when she got home). Aside from that, her poops have been what I would call normal. She has also had some where there is a normal solid, but then a LOT of water/ urine that came with it.
9) What has been the treatment you have administered so far?
We've seen 2 vets. (we were hoping that the second one would be more experienced treating birds) Regardless, the treatment so far has been as follows: Vet administered fluids (today was her third time getting fluids), Albon (for 5 days-finished), Panacur Suspension (for 5 days- finished), Neo-Calglucon Syrup (calcium) (for 7 days so far-ongoing), Baytril (for 6 days, the vet switched antibiotics today and had us stop giving Baytril. As of today: She is on Metacam-vet did not specify for how long (I'll call to check-but I suspect they don't expect her to make it so they did not bother with a time frame), Septra/TMS (every 12 hrs), Flagyl (every 12 hrs), again no specific time frame, this vet actually told us there is no point in giving a time frame but lets just say 5-7 days. We've also put her on vitamin E, B and Selenium
10 ) What is your intent as far as treatment? For example, do you want to treat completely yourself, or do you need help in stabilizing the bird til you can get to a vet? Assuming vet since you already have...
Our intent is for Cici to LIVE LONG AND PROSPER!! But for short term...We want to treat her as best we can, with the assistance of a vet, with the assistance of anyone that can assist us! We want to see her healthy and walking again. From here I need help to see if we are making the right decisions along that way. What are we dealing with? should we use steroids or not? Will metacam do anything from what others have experienced? Am I giving the medicine orally in the right place? (I am terrified of sending things to her lungs!) Are we overdosing her on vitamins? What can we do to help her drink better or straighten her neck back up?
11) If you have a picture of the wound or condition, please post it. It may help.
They are sad....but.....I have pictures and videos how can I post? I will look into that...
12) Describe the housing/bedding in use:
She lives out on our balcony/ porch.. we live in an apartment. She has some dirt to dig through, and we line the floor with cardboard to ease cleaning. She has pine bedding in her little house where she roosts. Since she has been sick she has been living indoors. I have her in the bedroom/computer room/ everything room since we have a small place. We have a heater going next to her and a humidifier. We keep the window open for fresh air. <---let me know if that should change. (the thermometer near her reads 27.7 degrees Celsius aka 81, almost 82 Degrees Fahrenheit. (is that too hot? I read somewhere that if they have watery poops it is because they are hot?!?) We have her in a low, open, cardboard box, laced with towels. She rests on a coiled towel that is laced with a piece of shower curtain (new) and then paper towels. I keep her on the paper towels because she poops a LOT and I try and change it after every poop, since she does not move much and I don't want her sitting in her own poop. I put the plastic in to keep the towel below from getting wet/ moldy since she poops so much.
My heart is so heavy right now. I really need a sign of hope..
The vet visit....well it went.... just went.... Everyone is writing her off, but at least this vet seemed to be more knowledgeable that the other once we've seen so far, and he was more polite about Cici life expectancy. (He did encourage us to take the number for some Chicken Dissection place so we could find out what was wrong with her after the fact...) Too bad he was at some conference when all this with Cici first started.
He gave her an injection of Vitamin A and B and he gave me one (with vitamin B only) to take home and give her today..which despite my fear of needles and ever GREATER fear of giving anyone else a shot, I did.
He put her back on Albon, having explained that coccidious is very difficult to get rid of and may still be running in there doing its dirty work. He put her on it twice a day (she had it once a day last time) and he also upped her calcium dose to twice a day.
Anyway, despite all this Cici is getting worst.... *sob* We've started tube feeding her....because she was loosing weight (she is at 308 grams now), I guess what she was eating on her own was not enough.
She is getting the Kaytee Exact baby bird formula. Since Tuesday morning August 16th, we've fed her 6 times about 6-15 cc each time (we gradually increased the amount since the doc said to go slow since she has not been eating at full strength for some time and because it was our first time tube feeding any animal and we were pretty much scared the way Cici is right now - poop-less!).
That brings me up to my most URGENT concern. (I am shacking as I write this because I am so scared and upset...) She is NOT POOPING! Since Tuesday morning she has only pooped ONCE (Tuesday at 11 PM) and that was only after I was wiping her butt with a warm wet paper towel. She let out a rather giant poop the same color as the formula we've given her. There was some white stuff in it and some bloody stuff..(a little piece of meat the size of half a raisin). It also smelled REALLY bad.
Since then there has been no more poop. I have never in my life wanted to see chicken poop so badly as I do now!!!!
I called the vet... He told me we've pretty much done all we can... but we can, if there is no poop by tomorrow morning, give her something that will "force" her to poop. But it is only a short term solution. I am leaning towards doing that just to give her body a few more days to try and fight / beat this thing (
The problem is.... I am not sure if her crop is emptying anymore (in tears). I fed her at 5 am and then at 9 am. Since then, it has not really emptied. I know so little about chickens that I am not even sure if that is normal! My guess is NO.
IS THERE ANY WAY TO NATURALLY HELP HER / STIMULATE HER TO POOP????????
The vet suggested giving her some hot water to help push things along...... (by the way he had us mix the formula with non-flavored Pediolyte and that is what he told us to give her as water)
She was going to the bathroom just FINE before the last vet visit (she pooped right before going in his office) Before the Vitamin shot and the Pediolyte with the formula. Could that have caused her to stop going???????????...or is this just hoe this mystery illness is progressing??
Right now.. she is resting. Her head bobbles back and forth....as if letting it turn the "correct" way bothers her (I can only describe it as a person nodding off to sleep and then popping their head back when they went to far down).
Aside from that, every now and then she tries to twist her head ever further closer to her feet and when she does that she flops her right wing and her right leg around and her head kind of twitches...
It really feels like her balance is what she is struggling to find....=\\
Ok that is it for now...
if anyone has any similar experiences...or can help,knows anything that would help, help her poop, help her eat, help with her balance, help with anything.....let us know...
(I wrote this before she pooped it took 20 hours between poops!!!!! but thank god she pooped!!! slow is better than none!)
Read Complete Thread: https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=556378&p=1
I have a thread (https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=556378&p=1) for my Cici, but here is the shorter (still long) version: I am not sure what she has. The latest avian vet said it is Merek's. But she had no paralysis! She does have weakness in the legs (at this point in her whole body) and she is now at the point where she no longer wakes up to eat or opens her eyes. We are tube feeding her, hoping that it will give her more time to concur this thing! Mainly, she has a VERY twister neck. It started with her just looking towards the left, went to completley stearing at the stars to all the way back around!!!
Anyway here is her info: please let me know if there is anything that can help with twisted beck. Will the Colloidal Silver work? what about bovine colostrum? Can I combine them? How much of each? I've also, after reading this post started her on Hypericum (first dose tonight). PLEASE... ANY HELP IS APPRECIATED!!!
1) What type of bird , age and weight:
Bantam hen, at least 1 year old, 300 grams
2) What is the behavior, exactly.:
Twisted neck/star gazing, weakness , loss of balance, unable to walk, (the neck is twisting more and more, to the point that she is trying to do a 360 or tuck it under her body!) She had coccidia, but it was treated. She also has a lump low on her body between the legs ( ) <-this wide and ( ) <--this long.... but the vet said it was not something we should worry about at this point as she feels no pain from it. Also, she has not been laying, not for some time, but we thought that it was because she has been molting and was still in the process of molting when this was set on.
3) How long has the bird been exhibiting symptoms?
Approx. 1 week
4) Are other birds exhibiting the same symptoms?
N/A-we only have 1 bird
5) Is there any bleeding, injury, broken bones or other sign of trauma.:
None known- we've done a blood test and a poop test, but no x-rays (would that help? doing x-rays?)
6) What happened, if anything that you know of, that may have caused the situation.
Unknown for the most part. I did smell bleach one day near our apartment. I know the cleaning staff uses that to clean the pathways sometimes so maybe some of that may have gotten in the soil that she dug through. We told the vet this but they did not seem to give it much thought.
7) What has the bird been eating and drinking, if at all.
Shea eats and drinks with a great appetite and enthusiasm, but struggles because of the twist in her neck. She disentangles her neck when she eats and appears very normal, like there is nothing wrong, however, after some chowing down, she will "chock" on a grain and that will bring her head tumbling down. Also, water is a HUGE deal breaker. She is very thirsty and tries to drink but each little tiny sip of water makes her head go insane, I can only describe it as an ice cream headache. She lays her head down , rests for a few seconds and then she is back at trying to eat. As for WHAT she has been eating: Scratch, mealworms, layers mash, high octane (fish oil) grains...and a mix of pellets <--I try and get whatever variety is available at the feed store. As for "real" food she gets lots of lettuce and fresh corn, and every now and then maybe once a week or so she'll get grapes, strawberries, watermelon). Since she has been sick we've given her bananas, honey, scrambled eggs, baby apple sauce <---she is not a big fan of this last one. Oh we've also given her whole grain bread dipped in vitamin water, because it is a way for her to take in water without her head going crazy. I have been giving her water by syringe- placing it near her beak one tiny drop at a time. This works better when she is resting/ sleeping, she does not seem as bothered by it.
8) How does the poop look? Normal? Bloody? Runny? etc.
She has literally had them all! The bloody poop only happened twice the entire time she has been sick. They happened late at night like 2 am. Most recently she had 2 poops that were soft almost diarrhea like. (She did get tube fed at the vet today and she did get fluids as well so that may be a result of the tube feeding. (she also ate her usual when she got home). Aside from that, her poops have been what I would call normal. She has also had some where there is a normal solid, but then a LOT of water/ urine that came with it.
9) What has been the treatment you have administered so far?
We've seen 2 vets. (we were hoping that the second one would be more experienced treating birds) Regardless, the treatment so far has been as follows: Vet administered fluids (today was her third time getting fluids), Albon (for 5 days-finished), Panacur Suspension (for 5 days- finished), Neo-Calglucon Syrup (calcium) (for 7 days so far-ongoing), Baytril (for 6 days, the vet switched antibiotics today and had us stop giving Baytril. As of today: She is on Metacam-vet did not specify for how long (I'll call to check-but I suspect they don't expect her to make it so they did not bother with a time frame), Septra/TMS (every 12 hrs), Flagyl (every 12 hrs), again no specific time frame, this vet actually told us there is no point in giving a time frame but lets just say 5-7 days. We've also put her on vitamin E, B and Selenium
10 ) What is your intent as far as treatment? For example, do you want to treat completely yourself, or do you need help in stabilizing the bird til you can get to a vet? Assuming vet since you already have...
Our intent is for Cici to LIVE LONG AND PROSPER!! But for short term...We want to treat her as best we can, with the assistance of a vet, with the assistance of anyone that can assist us! We want to see her healthy and walking again. From here I need help to see if we are making the right decisions along that way. What are we dealing with? should we use steroids or not? Will metacam do anything from what others have experienced? Am I giving the medicine orally in the right place? (I am terrified of sending things to her lungs!) Are we overdosing her on vitamins? What can we do to help her drink better or straighten her neck back up?
11) If you have a picture of the wound or condition, please post it. It may help.
They are sad....but.....I have pictures and videos how can I post? I will look into that...
12) Describe the housing/bedding in use:
She lives out on our balcony/ porch.. we live in an apartment. She has some dirt to dig through, and we line the floor with cardboard to ease cleaning. She has pine bedding in her little house where she roosts. Since she has been sick she has been living indoors. I have her in the bedroom/computer room/ everything room since we have a small place. We have a heater going next to her and a humidifier. We keep the window open for fresh air. <---let me know if that should change. (the thermometer near her reads 27.7 degrees Celsius aka 81, almost 82 Degrees Fahrenheit. (is that too hot? I read somewhere that if they have watery poops it is because they are hot?!?) We have her in a low, open, cardboard box, laced with towels. She rests on a coiled towel that is laced with a piece of shower curtain (new) and then paper towels. I keep her on the paper towels because she poops a LOT and I try and change it after every poop, since she does not move much and I don't want her sitting in her own poop. I put the plastic in to keep the towel below from getting wet/ moldy since she poops so much.
My heart is so heavy right now. I really need a sign of hope..
The vet visit....well it went.... just went.... Everyone is writing her off, but at least this vet seemed to be more knowledgeable that the other once we've seen so far, and he was more polite about Cici life expectancy. (He did encourage us to take the number for some Chicken Dissection place so we could find out what was wrong with her after the fact...) Too bad he was at some conference when all this with Cici first started.
He gave her an injection of Vitamin A and B and he gave me one (with vitamin B only) to take home and give her today..which despite my fear of needles and ever GREATER fear of giving anyone else a shot, I did.
He put her back on Albon, having explained that coccidious is very difficult to get rid of and may still be running in there doing its dirty work. He put her on it twice a day (she had it once a day last time) and he also upped her calcium dose to twice a day.
Anyway, despite all this Cici is getting worst.... *sob* We've started tube feeding her....because she was loosing weight (she is at 308 grams now), I guess what she was eating on her own was not enough.
She is getting the Kaytee Exact baby bird formula. Since Tuesday morning August 16th, we've fed her 6 times about 6-15 cc each time (we gradually increased the amount since the doc said to go slow since she has not been eating at full strength for some time and because it was our first time tube feeding any animal and we were pretty much scared the way Cici is right now - poop-less!).
That brings me up to my most URGENT concern. (I am shacking as I write this because I am so scared and upset...) She is NOT POOPING! Since Tuesday morning she has only pooped ONCE (Tuesday at 11 PM) and that was only after I was wiping her butt with a warm wet paper towel. She let out a rather giant poop the same color as the formula we've given her. There was some white stuff in it and some bloody stuff..(a little piece of meat the size of half a raisin). It also smelled REALLY bad.
Since then there has been no more poop. I have never in my life wanted to see chicken poop so badly as I do now!!!!
I called the vet... He told me we've pretty much done all we can... but we can, if there is no poop by tomorrow morning, give her something that will "force" her to poop. But it is only a short term solution. I am leaning towards doing that just to give her body a few more days to try and fight / beat this thing (
The problem is.... I am not sure if her crop is emptying anymore (in tears). I fed her at 5 am and then at 9 am. Since then, it has not really emptied. I know so little about chickens that I am not even sure if that is normal! My guess is NO.
IS THERE ANY WAY TO NATURALLY HELP HER / STIMULATE HER TO POOP????????
The vet suggested giving her some hot water to help push things along...... (by the way he had us mix the formula with non-flavored Pediolyte and that is what he told us to give her as water)
She was going to the bathroom just FINE before the last vet visit (she pooped right before going in his office) Before the Vitamin shot and the Pediolyte with the formula. Could that have caused her to stop going???????????...or is this just hoe this mystery illness is progressing??
Right now.. she is resting. Her head bobbles back and forth....as if letting it turn the "correct" way bothers her (I can only describe it as a person nodding off to sleep and then popping their head back when they went to far down).
Aside from that, every now and then she tries to twist her head ever further closer to her feet and when she does that she flops her right wing and her right leg around and her head kind of twitches...
It really feels like her balance is what she is struggling to find....=\\
Ok that is it for now...
if anyone has any similar experiences...or can help,knows anything that would help, help her poop, help her eat, help with her balance, help with anything.....let us know...
(I wrote this before she pooped it took 20 hours between poops!!!!! but thank god she pooped!!! slow is better than none!)
Read Complete Thread: https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=556378&p=1
Last edited:
I was deseperate.... until one day i was doing a google search about this disease and came across this website and this forum. I drove to the local health food store and purchased the things i needed and started treatment right away. Nothing happened the first few days and i was growing skeptical but then she slowly started to respond. The toes started to uncurl and in about one month she was running around with the others again! She has had a couple of times were she started to limp but i treat her right away and within two days she's fine again. Her one middle toe on the affected leg is permanently damaged it will not 
