month old pekin trouble walking

[allgoaton]

I have a pekin who is 3 weeks, going on 4 weeks old. She walks okay once she gets going but has trouble standing up from a sitting position and is a bit wobbly. Rest of ducks are fine, and they all are being fed with flock raiser crumbles with supplemented brewer's yeast. I've been doing about a heaping table spoon (a real table spoon, not a measurement) in their food once a day. Is this not enough? What is wrong with her legs?

 

[allgoaton]

She's the big yellow one standing, picture taken today. It doesn't LOOK like spraddle leg, since she can stand, right?

 

[Amiga]

Spraddle leg is when their legs are set way too widely apart. I wonder if you might increase the brewer's yeast. Let me see if I can find some data I looked up a while back.

Here is what I recorded from my search.

Best Guess on Brewer’s Yeast Equivalents

Okay, two tablespoons of brewer's yeast contains 10 mg of niacin, based on this page http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/custom/1323569/2

The guesswork is in how much water a duckling actually ingests in a day. If a duckling actually drinks a half a cup of water a day, it would be getting (16 cups in a gallon, 32 half cups in a gallon . . . . 150 divided by 30, more or less) 5 mg of niacin from water with 150 mg niacin per gallon. Which would be about a tablespoon of brewer's yeast.

So if you have given them a tablespoon split three ways, that may be a little low for her. Does she get swim time where she can float? I know when they are young we must watch them nonstop in the tub, but hydrotherapy might also help. And their bedding is no-skid, right?

 

[allgoaton]

Thank you! We are going to increase brewers yeast so they are getting more as well as increase swimming time. They swim every chance I get to put them in, but this ducky is actually the least enthusiastic about swimming.

They've been on towels their whole lives, just now switched to straw on one half plus towels on the other half. The are in their duck house with a heat lamp outside now, but previously their brooder was a cage that was a little bouncy. I wonder if the bouncy-ness contributed to the problem.