Rooster struggling to walk 🐔

[corviidae]

Hey everyone! Our dark brahma roo, Roach, had what we thought was a leg sprain around the 29th of July so we put him in a small tractor to discourage a lot of movement (he still could move around, but it’s capacity was for 4 standard chickens and it only fit him lol). He’s been spending almost all of his time in it.

We gave him a little bit of time to stretch his legs outside of it and put him back a couple hours later.

It hasn’t improved, and in fact seems a little worse today. He sits with the leg stretched out a little bit in front of him and does the same with the other one and has a heavier limp. Still has a good appetite and he took a syringe of poultry cell. We stuck him into a smaller hospital cage to keep him from straining his legs with a little bit of duck feed and water. Their current feed has a little bit of layer feed mixed in since we needed to use up the rest of it and transition to all flock and we didn’t want him to have anymore layer feed during this quarantine in case it might be causing problems.

I’m worried about mareks, as I hear that Privett Hatchery doesn’t vaccinate their chicks (please correct me if I’m wrong)- but I know it could be a deficiency, worms or maybe just a sprained leg that got worked too much. If it’s mareks, I haven’t seen our other chickens exhibit symptoms yet. Any ideas and maybe advice moving forward?

(A note that I’m not sure is related; he developed red streaks on his legs where his feathers grow when he hit maturity- especially prominent in the one that started having issues I think. )

I’m sorry if I’m drawing this out a lot. Thanks so much guys.

 

[sourland]

Red streaks in rooster legs are generally a sign of high testosterone levels. Good luck in his rehab. Hopefully it is not Marek's disease.

 

[corviidae]

Red streaks in rooster legs are generally a sign of high testosterone levels. Good luck in his rehab. Hopefully it is not Marek's disease.

Thank you.

As an update, he’s struggling worse with his other leg and it’s harder for him to uncurl them, from what my partner told me.

 

[Weeg]

@Wyorp Rock @azygous any ideas?
Assuming he has feelings in his legs? No paralysis? I would keep up the poultry cell encase it’s nutritional.
Any spots on his leg feel inflamed, hot, or seem painful? Check from his toes up to his hip.

 

[corviidae]

@Wyorp Rock @azygous any ideas?
Assuming he has feelings in his legs? No paralysis? I would keep up the poultry cell encase it’s nutritional.
Any spots on his leg feel inflamed, hot, or seem painful? Check from his toes up to his hip.

He does have feeling in his legs! He does seem tender because he’s been having to walk on his hocks. He never liked his feet being touched, but we didn’t feel any particularly hotter spot on his feet up to his hip, but it’s a little difficult when he’s just a big and warm chicken. We can check again though.

We started a .10ml injection of Vitamin B-Complex this morning and dewormed last night. we can totally start again on the poultry cell if it isn’t going to hurt him with the injections.

I also called the hatchery and the feed store we got him from. He is vaccinated against Mareks.

 

[corviidae]

Update: still doesn’t like his feet being touched, but there’s no heat difference. The leg he initially favored before he started struggling with both of them is red, but it’s the area he’s been using to walk rather than his feet.

 

[Weeg]

I would keep up with poultry cell and definitely the Vitamin B complex. Walking in hocks can be from a deficiency, that’s kind of what I’m leaning towards at this point.
Also, you can give the Vitamin B complex orally rather than injections. To mend it less stressful.
Keep it up, I hope he gets better soon. I think your on the right track.

 

[corviidae]

I would keep up with poultry cell and definitely the Vitamin B complex. Walking in hocks can be from a deficiency, that’s kind of what I’m leaning towards at this point.
Also, you can give the Vitamin B complex orally rather than injections. To mend it less stressful.
Keep it up, I hope he gets better soon. I think your on the right track.

Thank you so much. We probably won't switch to oral instead of injections, he gets really freaked out when we try to give him meds orally and hardly reacted when we did the injection. We'll keep doing the poultry cell orally via syringe, though, since his cage won't have room for the cell and water.

I'll keep the thread updated with how he's doing.

 

[Weeg]

Thank you so much. We probably won't switch to oral instead of injections, he gets really freaked out when we try to give him meds orally and hardly reacted when we did the injection. We'll keep doing the poultry cell orally via syringe, though, since his cage won't have room for the cell and water.

I'll keep the thread updated with how he's doing.

Either way works, if he does better with injections than that’s fine too.
I hope he stays to improve soon!

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Where you keep him, is it large enough for him to move about freely and stand up straight if he wished to do so?

What has he been being fed this whole time?

What did you deworm with?

I'd continue with the vitamin therapy and see how it goes.

If his joints are becoming swollen and red, he can end up with infection in the joint. You may want to consider placing him in a sling to get the weight off the joints. He needs to be monitored while in the sling.

The Marek's vaccine can help lessen the formation of tumors, but it does not prevent infection from the virus, so even vaccinated birds can become symptomatic, therefore, I would not rule out Marek's disease.

If you lose him, then getting a necropsy would give you answers. You can find your state lab here: https://www.metzerfarms.com/poultry-labs.html