Five-month old Australorp suddenly lame. Update: Now another pullet going lame!

[Allsfairinloveandbugs]

How is your dog doing, @HiEverybirdy ? The significance of your Clover girl continuing to make progress from paralysis two years+ after the fact wasnt lost on me. You no doubt have a good case study going on yourself. Also, after you loaded her photo AND mentioned the "terms of endearment" nicknames u have given her, it didnt escape my understanding the intensive labor and care required to care for a large breed dog, even harder than tending to a small size animal.

 

[texsuze]

Just now checking back in after dealing with the endless parade of workmen, repairs, etc. as we are still in recovery from The Big Freeze of February.

Anyway, I was so surprised to hear of the relapses in June and May. Almost seems as if "May's Syndrome" requires continuous or near-continuous pharmaceutical intervention to keep symptoms at bay. If the flare-ups are short-lived and recovery is always possible, then I could live with that. It's the uncertainty of it all that is so challenging.

I have kept Fay on the B vitamins and (when I can remember) Vit E as she has improved over the weeks. Not laying at present (I almost hope she does not), but she can walk up and down the ramp to her coop, make her way from the barn across 15 yards of ground to the grove of trees (their summer hang-out), and has surprised me by finding her way across the barn driveway to join her sisters under a cedar tree. Her gait is stiff-legged, and she still lays down a lot, but demands to be with her sisters. I still provide "mobility assistance" for her when I'm doing barn chores and at times if I'm not super careful about how she is lifted, she protests, leading me to believe there is a pain element with certain body positions. I am so proud of this chicken!

Over the last 2 months I've had to administer both Tylosin soluble (per veterinarian) and Denegard, since Fay's sister, Beatrice, has been symptomatic for some unknown malaise. Tested negative for parasites, but I'm presuming she, too, has a version of MG/MS since it is in my flock. I try to give recovery time between those dose periods and give yogurt once the AB treatment is over. I'm conflicted about having given two rounds of AB and wondering, Azy, if you are giving May and/or June the injectable version of Tylosin rather than the soluble. Keep up the good work with your girls!

 

[azygous]

I've been using Tylan 50 given orally. It's injectible, but it's such a caustic substance, I don't want to risk injection site necrosis.

Both May and June have only just begin to lay, and this relapse with both has been coincidental to the point of lay. It dawned on my that this may have drawn down thier calcium reserves to the point that it exacerbated their symptoms.

June had already recovered, but I popped a calcium tablet into May, and next day, her foot had uncurled and she began using it flat on the ground again.

I've started giving St John's Wort, and it could be helping, also.

 

[HiEverybirdy]

How is your dog doing, @HiEverybirdy ? The significance of your Clover girl continuing to make progress from paralysis two years+ after the fact wasnt lost on me. You no doubt have a good case study going on yourself. Also, after you loaded her photo AND mentioned the "terms of endearment" nicknames u have given her, it didnt escape my understanding the intensive labor and care required to care for a large breed dog, even harder than tending to a small size animal.

Clover's good. Yes, she's a bit bigger than a chicken, whew. If we hadn't been in okay shape, she might not have made it this far. Gingerly picking 50lb of deadweight off the ground many times daily is rough on the back.

It's been 2 years since this hit. She's much better but still not walking. We aren't sure she will. It's weird to have a dog who doesn't walk, and even weirder how normal it is. She wiggles from room to room, spends days outside sunning and watching over the chicken yard, enjoys car rides, etc. She's here because she still wants to be, and because we have the bandwidth to give her a full life.

I also have a few strands of hope left. She still makes progress, however slow. This week, her Vastus [I think] muscles were firing better as she picked up her hind legs to walk around her inflatable hot tub.

Since this thread started, I've been giving her B12 and E. I think it's way too late to mitigate whatever pathogen this was, so we're not loading her with antibiotics or anything, but those particular vitamins are low-risk, and it's certainly not too late to promote nerve health!

This has been a fascinating, fascinating thread. On so many levels.

 

[azygous]

Look who's just one of the girls now. May is in the center, holding her own with the young rambunctious bunch all fighting for an evening snack. May gets around well, is lively and interested in being in the middle of the action. She still has the stiff right leg, but she's letting it know that she's boss and she uses the leg without hesitation and ignores that it's not a smooth operation yet. If she keeps up this can-do attitude, by end of summer she may be walking pretty much normally.

 

[Ahall3133]

I want May to be well NOW dammit. Okay. Got that out of my system.

She's holding steady. I need to take that as encouragement that she's going to beat this thing, whatever the heck it is. She is alert, steady with no balance problems, eats okay, if not her normal amounts, but doesn't want to put weight on her right leg and she strokes it with her beak as if trying to encourage it to quit hurting.

Continuing aspirin twice a day along with the other vitamins, and she's under heat right now in the run, and seems content.

Can you give a chicken aspirin for a fever

 

[azygous]

If a chicken as a fever, they need more than just an aspirin. Aspirin for pain is very effective, though, and it helps heal inflammation of the tissues.

 

[azygous]

The above photo of May was a pivot point. She began crippling up again the next day. Today, she's back to dragging her right leg around instead of using it.

June also is regressing in the past couple days. She's wobbly and legs seem weak. If she has to hop down a step, my run being on a slope so it has 6 x 6s to hold the sand in place, she struggles to keep her balance as she lands.

I thought it might be a calcium drain from laying, so I've given calcium tablets, but to no effect. So this morning they both got a dose of doxycycline. I'm back to throwing random remedies at this to see what happens.

It's depressing. My new Blue Plymouth chicks will move into the brooding pen in the run today. They are all robustly healthy. I hope they stay that way.

 

[aart]

The above photo of May was a pivot point. She began crippling up again the next day. Today, she's back to dragging her right leg around instead of using it.

June also is regressing in the past couple days. She's wobbly and legs seem weak. If she has to hop down a step, my run being on a slope so it has 6 x 6s to hold the sand in place, she struggles to keep her balance as she lands.

Had you reduced their 'treatments'?

 

[azygous]

Yes. I was cutting back on the vitamins a bit. June hasn't been getting any, and May wasn't getting all of them.

I just took some cooked eggs out to feed to May and June and Su-su, and June did a rolling somersault in her eagerness to get to the eggs. That tells us her stems aren't connecting with her brain as they should. I didn't give them any E yet, but that would probably be a good idea.