Help! Chicken high stepping and walking very slowly.

[Ginntonix]

One of my very first roosters walked like that back when I fed only corn and I was new to chickens. I also have a rooster walking like that now, but he has visible injuries and is being treated for mites now. Back then I thought it was gout so diagnosed it as gout, before I ever knew about my mite problem. I started buying vitamins and feeding him supplemenntal foods that i thought would help. I know he ended up dying unexpectedly and his weight may have been low. So I am sure that he probably had mites. He could no longer walk up to any of the perches, and it was obvious something was very wrong by the way he walked.

I hope the treatment goes well. How is her weight now?

She's still eating and pooping and she feels fairly chunky. I haven't weighed her, but if I take her out of her box she doesn't scratch around or walk much so, as you say, it's glaringly obvious something is wrong with her. And she hasn't laid in 4 days now. Poor thing

 

[Eggcessive]

Scaly leg mites get under the scales and irritate and leave their droppings behind. You would see raised loose scales and a grey crust on the legs and feet. I don’t see that, but the tops of the feet and front of the legs is not very visible in the pics.

Chickens who lift their legs high or march, sometimes have arthritis or neurological disorders. I would watch her in case that is an early sign of Mareks disease, but hopefully not. Human vitamin E can be helpful sometimes for neurological disorders and a bit of scrambled egg daily can provide selenium, which helps with vitamin E uptake.

 

[Ginntonix]

Thanks everyone for your help! Just updating in case anyone has the same problem: it looks as though it's roundworm I dosed her food up with flubenvet two days ago (just in case) and today her poop had a couple of adult worms in. Pic attached is vile. So strange as they have monthly worming treatment.

I'm going to sterilise the coop, dose the food with extra flubenvet and keep her separated until she's not pooping them out any more.

And resist the urge to burn everything I own.

If anyone has any recommendations of how to avoid this again, I'd love to hear it.

 

[PippinTheChicken]

Thanks everyone for your help! Just updating in case anyone has the same problem: it looks as though it's roundworm I dosed her food up with flubenvet two days ago (just in case) and today her poop had a couple of adult worms in. Pic attached is vile. So strange as they have monthly worming treatment.

I'm going to sterilise the coop, dose the food with extra flubenvet and keep her separated until she's not pooping them out any more.

And resist the urge to burn everything I own.

If anyone has any recommendations of how to avoid this again, I'd love to hear it.

Regularly deworming your chickens. You can mix some DE into their food

 

[PippinTheChicken]

Regularly deworming your chickens. You can mix some DE into their food

https://www.bhwt.org.uk/health-welf...ecommend worming with,to stop eating the eggs.

 

[Ginntonix]

https://www.bhwt.org.uk/health-welfare/the-importance-of-worming-chickens/#:~:text=Our vets recommend worming with,to stop eating the eggs.

Thank you! They get flubenvet every month! And vermex/harkers in their water. It's the first time in over a year they've picked anything up; so strange. I'll start adding DE into the mix, thanks for the suggestion

And dose the dog up with extra Advocate, poor beastie