PLEASE help!! 9 weeks old chick not walking

[enola]

Are you weighing her? Weighing her would give you a better idea if she needs more food.

 

[sararoni]

I dont have a kitchen weight unfortunately.

 

[Fancychooklady]

That is enough to sustain her. Hydration is essential once you add the avian vits to her water stop giving her the B tabs. If she isn't drinking enough you will still need to syringe it to her. Mix the tuna in some cooked rice and try her on a little oatmeal. Buttermilk or Greek yoghurt will help to re coat the lining of her stomach .

 

[sararoni]

Yes I am giving her plain greek yoghurt and moving the cup of the food in front of her constantly.
She always takes a bite or two.
I dont see her drinking the vitamin water. I will give her some with the syringe now.
Fancychooklady you read my mind, I was going to ask if I should still give her b vitamin now that the vitamin&electrolyte was added to her water

Here she is today:



I put her on some burlap till the 2 towels I change daily dry.
I will change that in the morning because it seems slippery.
I want to keep her as clean as I can, her poop is still watery and green.
I will take a picture next time she poops.

 

[Fancychooklady]

It may take some time before you see any improvement . I use paper hand towel , the absorbent type. It's easy to replace and I burn the soiled stuff.

 

[sararoni]

That is very hope giving to hear that she still can get better.
And the paper towels will be a huge help. I cut her a towel in 2 but washing, bleaching and drying them is not that practical.
It will be so wonderful if this case will have a positive ending. I fear for the other 5 chicks too.
I hope it is not mareks.
Thank you all for being here for me and other people like me.
This is a blessing.

 

[Fancychooklady]

Keep an eye on the others and watch for symptoms. Better to do the research and be prepared than to stick your head in the sand. Attached is @Nambroth
Informative article on mareks, hopefully she will drop in and give her opinion. You are not alone, we will be here no matter what the outcome.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/the-great-big-giant-mareks-disease-faq

 

[Nambroth]

How is she doing? Have you been weighing her. It seems that her BM's are getting less green which is good. Did I already suggest a bit of milk thistle? That last, really orangy green one may have just been from the B vitamins. It had that bright, artificial, neon green color rather than a deep liver enzyme green. The mareks vaccine only costs $25 with shipping from Jeffers. I have read a study (and I have to find it again) that suggested that you can vaccinate an older flock and expect protection or a less severe outbreak even if they have already been exposed to the virus. I believe the study or studies that I read also suggested some benefit in vaccinating a bird that is already symptomatic. Birds expose to Mareks usually can become symptomatic starting at about 5 weeks and I can't remember what the cutoff age is but that's just an average. Birds can actually become symptomatic at any age.

I don't want to derail this thread very much, but everything I have researched about the vaccines for and the virus itself suggest that inoculation after symptoms are present is not beneficial and may even be harmful. Are you sure it was a study and not just an article written by someone? If you find it again please do send me a message with the link or a way for me to read it so that I can keep my FAQ current with scientific findings.
Vaccinating after known exposure to Marek's is also likely to be without merit. Vaccinating after 36 hours of age might help but it is not going to build the same immune response to the virus, and will only help if the birds are not exposed to the live virus within 3 weeks (minimum).
Again if I am wrong about any of this I'd love to be corrected, I am not a professional, I am just a research nut.

I should also mention in general it will cost about $50 to get the vaccine overnighted from any supplier (Including Jeffers), as it must be kept cold this time of year, and one will need to buy syringes of the appropriate size as well unless one has access to them locally.

 

[sararoni]

Good Heaven this little chick must have been born under a lucky star nevertheless

I was just reading your detailed article Nambroth when you wrote back.
Thank you fancychockslady for thinking of this.

Avian encephalomyelitis sounds less scary than mareks I guess. I couldnt play the video that shows the poor infected chick so I could understand what the trembling looks like.
My chick`s tail trembles sometimes but her neck and head seem fine.

I will look for coconut oil in the morning. I have coconut flakes (the kind you use for cookies) if that might help?

I noticed today that her toes are not curled anymore. I dont know if that is an improvement or just the result of her legs being completely paralyzed now.
She still kicks them when I get her but she cant stand on them at all.

We dont know about the breeder. I think my friend got them in an auction and the breeder never confirmed any problems.

I will go reread again now the article and the links and learn some more.
Thank you all

 

[rbaker0345]

I don't mean to derail the thread even more but I figured that I would respond to you, nambroth. Here is one abstract I read:
It deals with revaccination of non-symptomatic birds and one could infer that vaccination of birds which are non-symptomatic, even if they are older and even if they have been exposed to the virus through a maternal source, would have the same or similar results. I know that the vaccine is turkey herpesvirus while the chicken virus is a bit different but I've been vaccinating my older birds (like you sort of hinted around in your article) and it seems to be effective at just about any age. Just HOW effective, I have yet to find out, I guess only time will tell but so far, so good.
Revaccination with Marek's Disease Vaccines Induces Productive Infection and Superior Immunity▿

1. Changxin Wu1,5,*,
2. Junji Gan1,
3. Qiao Jin1,
4. Chuangfu Chen2,
5. Ping Liang1,
6. Yantao Wu1,
7. Xuefen Liu1,
8. Li Ma4 and
9. Fred Davison3

+ Author Affiliations

1. 1Laboratory of Animal Infectious Diseases of Agricultural Ministry of China, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou 225009, China
2. 2Department of Veterinary Medicine, Shihezi University, Shihezi 832003, China
3. 3Laboratory of Avian Immunology, Institute for Animal Health, Compton RG20 7NN, United Kingdom
4. 4Research Centre, Northern Jiangsu Hospital, Yangzhou 225009, China
5. 5Department of Veterinary Medicine, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB3 0ES, United Kingdom

Next Section
ABSTRACT

The most common lymphoproliferative disease in chickens is Marek's disease (MD), which is caused by the oncogenic herpesvirus Marek's disease virus (MDV). The emergence of hypervirulent pathotypes of MDV has led to vaccine failures, which have become common and which have resulted in serious economic losses in some countries, and a revaccination strategy has been introduced in practice. The mechanism by which revaccination invokes superior immunity against MD is unknown. After field trials which showed that revaccination provided protection superior to that provided by a single vaccination were performed, experiments were conducted to explore the interaction between revaccinated chickens and MDV. The results showed that the chickens in the revaccination groups experienced two consecutive productive infections but that the chickens in the single-vaccination groups experienced one productive infection, demonstrating that revaccination of viruses caused the chickens to have productive and then latent infections. Revaccination of the virus induced in the chickens a higher and a longer temporary expansion of the CD8+, CD4+, and CD3+ T-lymphocyte subpopulations, stronger peripheral blood lymphocyte proliferative activity; and higher levels of neutralizing antibody than single vaccination. These findings disagree with the postulate that MDV antigens persist, stimulate the immune system, and maintain a high level immunity after vaccination. The suppression of productive infection by maternal antibodies in chickens receiving the primary vaccination and a lower level of productive infection in the revaccination groups challenged with MDV were observed. The information obtained in this study suggests that the productive infection with revaccinated MDV in chickens plays a crucial role in the induction of superior immunity. This finding may be exploited for the development of a novel MD vaccine that results in the persistence of the antigen supply and that maintains a high level of immunity and may also have implications for other viral oncogenic diseases in humans and animals.




I have no idea where I came up with the idea of vaccinating a symptomatic bird. I need to start bookmarking the abstracts and articles that I read, but I'm usually looking for answers to something else and only find them interesting but not pertinent so I dont think ahead for the moment when they become pertinent later and by then I've lost them. So without a supporting argument I have to say that vaccinating a bird that is already symptomatic should be avoided. But if the other birds were not vaccinated, I would still say that they could be vaccinated.

I do have my Mareks shipped ground. I wait until the weather is cool but not freezing and then I stock up, so its only about $25 per vial. I feel confident doing it this way because I inadvertently left a vial of the vaccine out for a couple of weeks before I used it and then I re-read the part about keeping it in the fridge. Thought I had killed all of my chicks but it was still an effective vaccine, so now I go ground. (I live in an epidemic area so I would know with certainty if the vaccine had lost effectiveness) But I do keep it in the fridge once I get it- I will only tempt the hand of fate so much.
Also, I use u100's which are only $2 per bag of 10 from CVS so it makes it totally affordable.

I know, I'm bucking convention but it works so I go with it.

But I digress- sorry.

I do hope it isn't Mareks though and I guess I glossed over the part where she started showing symptoms at 2 weeks- I had the nine week figure in my head from the title. However while it is true that most cases don't show up until week 5, I have heard that in severe cases it can show up a little earlier, but two weeks does sound too early, so that would be good news- right?.

You were talking about fats and we've all been talking about B vitamin deficiencies but Vitamin E is one of the fat soluble vitamins and vitamin E and selenium have this mysterious relationship with neurological/muscular/skeletal development and health. If she isn't getting good fats and she has a malabsorbtion issue, maybe its just a vita E and selenium deficiency in both birds. Could be a deficiency which started in the hen that laid the eggs they hatched from.