Double yolk, now can’t walk and no egg for 3 days

[sharpie22]

Have a 10 month year old barred rock that is having some issues. 3 days ago she pushed out a massive double yolk egg...literally double the size of her normal eggs. Since then she has been weird and within a day was just laying down and refused to walk.

I put her in a temporary location away from the flock, gave her some calcium (tums) mixed with some yogurt and fresh food and water. She is still eating and drink and seems alert but will not put any pressure on her legs. Spreads her wings out a little bit and just laying all fluffy on some towels in a

Thinking she may be egg bound I reached up in her vent and felt for an egg - nothing from what I can tell. We may be married now after that interaction...I’m not sure. First time inside a chicken - hopefully last?

Any ideas/suggestions? Poop appeared very watery with green nodules the first day but now is back to normal tan/green mix.

 

[micstrachan]

I have forgotten what it's called, but there is a condition where an egg can press on a nerve and cause (temporary) paralysis. Calcium was a good call. What else does she eat? Is she unABLE to walk or unWILLING to walk?

Does she have a nice warm spot to relax and rest?

 

[Shezadandy]

Have a 10 month year old barred rock that is having some issues. 3 days ago she pushed out a massive double yolk egg...literally double the size of her normal eggs. Since then she has been weird and within a day was just laying down and refused to walk.

I put her in a temporary location away from the flock, gave her some calcium (tums) mixed with some yogurt and fresh food and water. She is still eating and drink and seems alert but will not put any pressure on her legs. Spreads her wings out a little bit and just laying all fluffy on some towels in a

Thinking she may be egg bound I reached up in her vent and felt for an egg - nothing from what I can tell. We may be married now after that interaction...I’m not sure. First time inside a chicken - hopefully last?

Any ideas/suggestions? Poop appeared very watery with green nodules the first day but now is back to normal tan/green mix.

I agree w/ @micstrachan - probably the big egg is caused the issue. The green poop was likely caused when she still had the big egg developing and taking up lots of room in the abdomen, so she may have not eaten and/or the intestines were blocked. Now that the egg is gone, she's eating and food is moving through again.

Do you have some aspirin that you can grind up and put in the yogurt or another treat she's likely to devour? I use the baby aspirin 81mg, usually 3 of them for an average sized 5-6lb chicken, ground up and mixed in to something she likes. It tastes better than the regular aspirin and also easier to dose than guessing at breaking up a 325mg pill.

 

[ChicNmom]

Keep giving the calcium.

If you want to try the aspirin as noted above you may want to double check the dose by doing a search. Normal advice here is a half baby aspirin for a full size chicken.

The average dose for dogs is 1/4 81mg tablet per 5lbs of body weight. So 3 tablets sounds high to me.

If you want to be sure she is getting the meds I would just pop it in her beak. It's hard to know if they are getting enough of a med in their system at once when mixed with food.

 

[sharpie22]

Is she unABLE to walk or unWILLING to walk?

Great question. So she literally doesn’t move on the ground...legs are straight back and only her head and wings are moving. Wherever I put her, she is in the same spot in the morning. That being said, I did pick her up and see if her legs could take any pressure - that resulted in her literally screaming bloody murder at me...my toddler informed me that would not be a good idea to try again.

I’ll try the baby aspirin next and will check on the dosage.

How often and how much for the tums? Is that a once a day thing or more like 4x daily or what ?

Going on day 4 and still alive, so safe to say not egg bound?

 

[micstrachan]

Can you post a photo? Do you know if she was vaccinated for Marek’s? Periods of time in a chicken sling might make her more comfortable and allow her to move her legs a bit.

 

[LaFleche]

Did you check her vent for possible prolapse?

 

[sharpie22]

Did you check her vent for possible prolapse?

Just searched on google for prolapsed vents...wow, no that is definitely not happening. That may have scarred me for a bit.

Can you post a photo? Do you know if she was vaccinated for Marek’s? Periods of time in a chicken sling might make her more comfortable and allow her to move her legs a bit.

She did come from a hatchery that vaccinates all their chickens for Marek’s.

Photos attached. One eye appears to be closed this morning for some reason, but she did turn around a bit overnight.

 

[Cazook]

https://www.backyardchickens.com/ar...using-obturator-paralysis-a-case-study.76120/ This might be helpful. If she does have obturator paralysis from trying to pass the large egg, apparently they can recover but it takes some weeks to improve.

 

[sharpie22]

Working with her this morning we have some improvement. The left leg is still back, but the right one is now under her body and she appears to be trying to put pressure on it. Hopefully the other comes back soon.