Hurt Legs

[gkeesling]

I have a 12 week old RIR pullet who wouldn't stand when I went into the coop to feed. I reached down to pick her up and she didn't try to get away like they always do. I put her down and she tried to stand and fell back down. Finally I did get her to stand and she walked real wobbly like she had hurt legs. I'm wondering what happened to her. I do have two roosts in the coop that are about 2 1/2 feet and 4 feet up. Normally they don't use those roosts yet but there is poop on both of them so I know they go on them some. Could she have gotten up on one of them, jumped down, and hurt her legs? Any ideas?
Think she will recover, or die?

 

[Attack Chicken]

Could she have sprained her legs after jumping off the roosts? I don't really know I hope someone can help you better than I can.

 

[sammi]

how many hens and roosters do you have?
it's possible she could have jumped from the roost and injured herself.
need more info..
check the legs, and hip area for any heat or swelling.
check the bottoms of the feet for any sores, lumps, or scab..

what all do you feed?
are they protected from draft?

has she been wormed? if so when? and what was used?
is she thin?
describe the droppings..color and consistency.

is she eating and drinking?
if she's having trouble walking..she probably isn't eating much if at all..

separate the hen to a warm safe place with soft bedding, where you can tend to her and observe closely.

check her crop..see if it is empty, check for lumps..or any sour odor.
check for any other symptoms, such as wheezing..

get some Poly-vi-sol liquid baby vitamins, Enfamil brand if possible, no iron..give 2 drops once a day for a week, then 1 drop for another week..in the meantime, get some poultry vitamins for the drinking water..
She sounds weak..or may have rickets..
but answer the questions/checks above since it could be something else...
in the meantime..
make up this mixture>

Feed the bird three times a day this mixture.
the amounts shown are for for the 3 feeds for 1 day...give for 3-5 days.
also have regular feed and water as usual.

1 egg yolk
1 teaspoon honey
2 tablespoons plain yogurt
3 tablespoons water cooked oatmeal
regular layer feed to add substance

Mix to make a crumble mixture not soupy, if you have to roll into pellets and force feed, and then massage the neck to get it down, the bird may be too weak to eat or have lost the desire to eat…. Don’t hold back…. The longer it goes without this the worse it will get

If you must give it something to drink – only give drops onto the beak or use the crop tube to get fluids down the throat, don’t try and pour any fluid down a chickens throat, it will more than likely go into the air passage and into the lungs and end up drowning the bird

 

[gkeesling]

gosh, that's a lot of things. thank you for all that information. I'll go check these out on her and see if I can detect anything that I haven't noticed so far.

all of my chickens are 12 weeks. I have 12 Barr Rock Pullets, 5 RIR pullets, and 2 RIR roosters. One of the Barr Rocks, I th ought was a rooster, but as it gets older I think it's a pullet.

None of them have been wormed.

She seems to be eating and drinking. I saw her get some water yesterday and she was laying next to the waterer this morning when I went out to check on them. She did get up and "hobbled" away when I approached to change the water.

My thought is that she injured herself when she jumped down from one of the roosts as they aren't quite used to that yet. But, I'm sure going to go and check out the other things you suggested. These 19 chickens are my very first so I'm rather inexperienced at what I'm doing. I've really learned a lot here from the nice people in this forum.
thank you again.