Chicken doing somersaults, looses consciousness, and back to normal.

[Family with a Chicken]

My chicken is doing sudden somersaults.
Then, she lays unconscious for a while - when the "attack" is not very bad she lays for only a minute or so, but when it is very bad she lays for hours.
Then, she regains consciousness and acts normal as if nothing happened to her.

Can anyone help me? The vets here do not seem to be knowledgeable about this and we HATE to see her suffer so much! I am willing to do everything to help her recover from the thing triggering this to her!

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Welcome To BYC

How old is she?
What do you feed?

The symptoms you describe sounds neurological. Hard to know the cause - some common things are disease like Marek's, genetics/developmental issues or possible nutritional/vitamin deficiency.

You can try vitamin therapy to see if that makes any difference. 400IU Vitamin E and 1/4 B-Complex tablet once a day for a couple of weeks. Give her a little treat of egg, tuna or sunflower seeds to help with the uptake of E.

If you happen to catch this behavior on video, it would be interesting to see. Upload video to youtube and provide a link.

 

[Family with a Chicken]

Welcome To BYC

How old is she?
What do you feed?

The symptoms you describe sounds neurological. Hard to know the cause - some common things are disease like Marek's, genetics/developmental issues or possible nutritional/vitamin deficiency.

You can try vitamin therapy to see if that makes any difference. 400IU Vitamin E and 1/4 B-Complex tablet once a day for a couple of weeks. Give her a little treat of egg, tuna or sunflower seeds to help with the uptake of E.

If you happen to catch this behavior on video, it would be interesting to see. Upload video to youtube and provide a link.

Thank you for your message!
She was born at the end of May 2020, so around 9 months old. We feed her chick crumbs from the pet shop. Around 2 weeks ago, when this whole attack started, we started giving her a fruit or a vegetable everyday.
Thank you so much for your suggestions. Will definitely try it out.
From where shall I find the Vitamins and tablets please?
I will try to capture this on video. What I have been able to capture today were the moments after the somersaults, just before totally passing out. Here are the links
1)

2)

3)

I will try to capture the whole somersault action but believe me, I freeze every time this happens. It's so scary and say to see her go through all that!
But when she regains consciousness, she's back to normal as if nothing happened.

 

[LaFleche]

Hello and welcome to BYC!

I just watched your videos and this does look concerning.

Do you keep her in this cage all the time? Her claws look very long which makes me believe that she has no outside time and is kept in this little cage all the time?
If so, she will be vitamin D3 deficient and need immediate supplementation.

With the ongoing seizure her face and comb have a blueish tint which indicates lack of oxygen and her tongue looks rather strange. Can you look insider her beak to see if there is something stuck in her throat blocking the airway?

Did you check both her ears for insects such as ticks etc. or infection? Does she emanate a sickly sweet smell?

 

[Family with a Chicken]

Hello and welcome to BYC!

I just watched your videos and this does look concerning.

Do you keep her in this cage all the time? Her claws look very long which makes me believe that she has no outside time and is kept in this little cage all the time?
If so, she will be vitamin D3 deficient and need immediate supplementation.

With the ongoing seizure her face and comb have a blueish tint which indicates lack of oxygen and her tongue looks rather strange. Can you look insider her beak to see if there is something stuck in her throat blocking the airway?

Did you check both her ears for insects such as ticks etc. or infection? Does she emanate a sickly sweet smell?

Thank you for your message!
No, we usually keep her in the garden during the day (except for when she appears week like today - we can tell that she is going to have an attack as she acts differently). During the night we keep her in the cage too as we bring her inside as we do not want her to feel cold. But rest assured, on normal days she is in the garden playing. Our garden is tiled though... Is that bad? We also have an area of soil with trees and plants but she never goes in it.
From where can I find this Vitamin D3 supplement please?
With regards to her beak, nothing seems to be blocking the way. She only does those mouthing movements after a attack happens, never during the day.
I did not see anything in her ears also and she does not smell any different than before.

 

[LaFleche]

Thank you for your message!
No, we usually keep her in the garden during the day (except for when she appears week like today - we can tell that she is going to have an attack as she acts differently). During the night we keep her in the cage too as we bring her inside as we do not want her to feel cold. But rest assured, on normal days she is in the garden playing. Our garden is tiled though... Is that bad? We also have an area of soil with trees and plants but she never goes in it.
From where can I find this Vitamin D3 supplement please?
With regards to her beak, nothing seems to be blocking the way. She only does those mouthing movements after a attack happens, never during the day.
I did not see anything in her ears also and she does not smell any different than before.

You could order poultry vitamins online, just make sure they contain calcium, vitamin D3+K, D, E, B-complex, A and some electrolyte also.

Is it a possibility that she was bitten by some poisonous insect or snake while in your garden?
Some poisonous critters can cause this kind of neurological damage leading to epileptic seizures.

 

[LaFleche]

Some more questions:

I she a single chicken in your household or do you have some more chickens?

Did you hatch her yourself in an incubator or was she hatched by a broody hen?

Did you buy her as a chick or later as she was already some weeks or months old?

 

[Family with a Chicken]

Thank you for your message!
No, we usually keep her in the garden during the day (except for when she appears week like today - we can tell that she is going to have an attack as she acts differently). During the night we keep her in the cage too as we bring her inside as we do not want her to feel cold. But rest assured, on normal days she is in the garden playing. Our garden is tiled though... Is that bad? We also have an area of soil with trees and plants but she never goes in it.
From where can I find this Vitamin D3 supplement please?
With regards to her beak, nothing seems to be blocking the way. She only does those mouthing movements after a attack happens, never during the day.
I did not see anything in her ears also and she does not smell any different than before.

You could order poultry vitamins online, just make sure they contain calcium, vitamin D3+K, D, E, B-complex, A and some electrolyte also.

Is it a possibility that she was bitten by some poisonous insect or snake while in your garden?
Some poisonous critters can cause this kind of neurological damage leading to epileptical seizures.

Thanks for the info! Snake is impossible in Malta, but an insect can be very possible...

 

[LaFleche]

Thanks for the info! Snake is impossible in Malta, but an insect can be very possible...

Malta. So what kind of poisonous insects like spiders etc. do you have in Malta?

 

[Family with a Chicken]

Some more questions:

I she a single chicken in your household or do you have some more chickens?

Did you hatch her yourself in an incubator or was she hatched by a broody hen?

Did you buy her as a chick or later as she was already some weeks or months old?

Single chicken, she was hatched by a hen, we adopted her as a chick but she was around 2 weeks old.