Official BYC Poll: Special Needs Poultry

[shanadienne]

I looked through your thread, he's quite the survivor! That's cute he chases his own tail. Do you have any recent pictures of him?

Sadly we lost him to a predator some years ago but you'll probably like this video I have of him back in 2018. My darling Hei-Hei. Physically he recovered great. Mentally... he was Hei-Hei and we loved him.

 

[Lacy Duckwing]

Sadly we lost him to a predator some years ago but you'll probably like this video I have of him back in 2018. My darling Hei-Hei. Physically he recovered great. Mentally... he was Hei-Hei and we loved him.

Oh, I'm so sorry that you lost him! That's so sad!

Thanks for sharing the video. He must have chased his tail a lot, right?

 

[shanadienne]

Oh, I'm so sorry that you lost him! That's so sad!

Thanks for sharing the video. He must have chased his tail a lot, right?

I think it depended on how he was feeling that day and whether there were real hens immediately available.

 

[RoostersAreAwesome]

Sadly we lost him to a predator some years ago but you'll probably like this video I have of him back in 2018. My darling Hei-Hei. Physically he recovered great. Mentally... he was Hei-Hei and we loved him.

My one-eyed pigeon has chased his tail a couple times, but never with that much enthusiasm!

 

[chickadeo]

My little one is named Eepy. Right now they're 2 weeks old and seem to have some kind of neurological issue that prevents them from being able to get up on their own, maintain balance, and walk. Even still they have a lot of energy and strength. They're very spunky! I have been doing chicky PT with them every day and helping them walk. They love being upright and very slowly have been improving. The past couple days they have been running and flapping their wings! They can only do so for a few seconds, but it's still huge progress from their day 1. I'm hoping I can get them to a point where they can balance on their own. Even still, I don't know if I'll ever reintegrate them with their hatch-mates due to the extent of their issues.

It's been comforting and encouraging to find other folks who have disabled chickens as well. I feel like a "crazy chicken lady", but I just can't give up on the little guy when he clearly wants to live. Admittedly, finding any threads about disabled chickens has been immensely difficult. I only found this one due to it being linked to me directly by another helpful forum member.

 

[Lacy Duckwing]

@Lanfear, come share Ember's story here and join this thread!

 

[picklestheduck]

I think special needs birds are just something that happens to most poultry keepers at some point in time. I’ve kept a flock for about three years now, and I’ve had my fair share of special needs birds, but I’ve also took on the challenge of helping them thrive when many people told me they would never make it. I’ll try to make this short since I could write pages on each bird. The first one that really tested my ability was Sage, a little duckling and who failed to thrive. I made the mistake of only buying two ducklings, so when Sage became ill I quickly ran to the store and bought two more ducklings to live with the lone one, and moved Sage into my room in a small Rubbermaid tote, and hung a heat lamp off my dresser. Day and night I gently force fed this little bird and syringed vitamin b etc. Before I knew it, a month had passed and Sage was on the mend. Yes it took a month of caring for him, but he survived. Since then I’ve dealt with and helped to nurse along hens with eggs burst inside of them, hens so picked on that they were completely bald and bleeding, and many more, but thankfully all those birds have mended. Recently I bought a batch of Easter eggers from the store, and quickly realized that most of them had beak problems. Now all five of them seem to look and function normally, I just have to keep an eye on overgrown beaks etc. One of the chicks seemed to get trampled and had an odd way she held her head, but after quickly administering vitamins and nutrients, she now is totally normal. I’ve been lucky to never have an illness or predator take a bird from me, but I know it’s eventually just a part of poultry keeping. We’ve been lucky to come this far. Here’s a few pictures of my “special needs” birds.

 

[Lanfear]

Hi folks, I have a special little birdy in my flock right now. I've had guineas and chickens together for years, and what do you know, this year I hatched out a hybrid day 22 from a guinea egg, whom I dubbed Ember - I say she's a 'her' but I actually don't know. Let me preface this by saying these hybrids are very rare for a reason - guineas and chickens have different number of chromosomes. Many of these eggs terminate before final development, and many more yet die shortly after hatching. They're typically genetic disasters and I don't encourage purposefully trying to hatch any.

At first I thought she had curled toes from hatching inside the cabinet incubator due to the slippery surface on the bottom, so I vet wrapped her toes straight.

But anytime I took the wrappings off, the toes reset crookedly. Slowly it got worse, so I knew it must be a genetic defect. She wore various types of booties for the first month of life, all to no avail.

I took her to the vet to see if there were any options including if amputation could make walking easier, they sadly said it wouldn't be quality life and suggested I euthanize her. She was struggling a bit to move but still seemed to want to live, so they put some little vet wrap booties on her and we took her back home. The vet thought the right foot had hope of fixing, but that the left was already pretty much grown and stuck that way.

She wore them for a few weeks. When I removed them her feet were turned inside still but at least the right foot had improved. Fast forward a bit and I found some other booties -neosponge with silver fibre woven into the fabric supposedly for healing properties - they're more so made for chickens and ducks with bumblefoot but I thought these could be a good option to pad her feet and offer support, and I'm happy to say, her walking and balance ability has improved!

I don't know if in the end she will worsen and need to be euthanized, but we'll take it day by day. As long as she seems happy, eating, and isn't being picked on it's good enough for me.

 

[ZenChickens]

View attachment 3610017
Sweet Pea.
She lost both her feet from frostbite. She was given to me when her feet turned black because the people no longer wanted her. She is only a year old. She lays a beautiful blue green egg almost every day.

How does she get around? How do you take care of her? We have a chicken without legs too and it's juts so hard... would love to hear about your story...

 

[maeflower1992]

How does she get around? How do you take care of her? We have a chicken without legs too and it's juts so hard... would love to hear about your story...

Because her nubs are they same length she hobbles/walks around just fine. She is shorter than the rest of the chickens. I just have to ensure that her pen is kept clean and doesn't get muddy. We actually just moved them to my parents old lean-to coop and it is much better. They stay way dryer than they were before. She has been missing her legs for almost 2 years now. They are completely healed and she doesn't get sores on the bottem anymore.

How long has your chicken been without legs? Would you care to send photos? On here or you can message me. What would be the reason you say it is harder to take care of him/her? I would love to help anyway I can.