Silky chick with wry neck round two!!!

[buggie30]

Around June 18th I had discovered that one of my silkies chicks had wry neck. I researched this forum and started her on the polyvisol which cleared it up about 4 days later and I then moved her back with the others. I gave her the vitamin for 1 week. Last night I noticed the problem has reoccurred and have moved her back in and began the vitamin again. As of today she seems to making progress I have continued to research and my question is should I also be giving her the vitamin E with Selenium? If so how much and for how long? To my understanding the Selenim helps them absorb the E. My other question is how long should I continue with the polyvisol? Any help is greatly appreciated .


My next problem is her silkie sister has a unaligned beak. thoughts?

 

[MotherJean]

The Polyvisol should have everything she needs in the way of vitamin supplements, but does not contain selenium. Not sure if you can get that as a separate supplement or not.

I am curious as to the reason why this chick (in particular) needs another course of treatment. Are you feeding a commercial feed that has all the vitamins and minerals added to it? Is this chick eating enough? Maybe there's a systemic problem that doesn't allow this chick to convert (metabolize) the feed to get the nutrition she needs. The only other thing that comes to mind is that Vitamin E/Selenium deficiency that remains untreated for very long can result in muscular dystrophy. That doesn't seem to apply, here, because it sounds like she improved and had no symptoms for awhile.

Very odd.

 

[buggie30]

She is doing better more time up and about and eating & drinking then spending her time all twisted up. She is on a chick starter feed and she has the polyvisol 3 drops twice a day. After the first episode she went about two weeks before this occurrence. How long would you suggest keeping her on the polyvisol? I'm thinking of keeping her on for a longer period of time seeing I had her on it for a week and it has returned. I found the Vitamin E with Selenium at a health food store. I will start her on it tomorrow, any suggestions for how long I should give it to her and the dose? Thanks for the help.

 

[kimb]

I also provide water with vitamins/electrolytes and add vitamin b & e (dollar store brand) dissolved, into the water - and change it daily - i provided this for a week straight - then cut it down to every other day for a week, then a few days a week, Now I provide it 1 day a week to my silkies and 1x a month in all the other waterers ... just easiest for me ... I did poly vi sol drops also for a 4-7 days for the affected chick with the electrolytes.

My silkie took 2 months to fully recover and just had an episode (8 months later) when one of the other chickens scared her pretty bad (she's a very very timid chicken) ... so i gave her poly-vi-sol for the day, and then vitamin water for the week and she was good as new

Silkies are TOUGH imo - I was used to very self-sufficient chickens prior to the flock I have now

Good Luck!



As for the crooked beak you can trim it a little (I'd use a finger nail file and just file a little down on each side - depending on how bad it is ) but for the most part, they'll learn to adapt pretty well - just provide a deep dish for food so that she has an easier time eating

 

[MotherJean]

It's possible that your silkie suffered some mild but permanent nerve/brain damage. So long as it is doing well on the vitamins, I would continue indefinitely. However, I would reduce the amount your are giving to avoid the chance of overdose. Reduce the Polyvisol to 1 drop per day. If the Vitamin E/Selenium is in the gel capsule, pierce that with a pin and squeeze one or two drops per day directly into the beak, too. One of the symptoms of oil-based vitamin overdose is fatigue, vomiting, and diarrhea. Keep watch for those symptoms and stop giving the vitamin supplements if you see anything like that.

 

[buggie30]

Thank You all for all the help. Fortunately I can take a little from everyone and see what works. Hopefully this will subside. I'll send an update. Thank You

 

[JayDe]

My Rooster, who is now 9 months old is in his 2nd bout with Wry Neck. Last time, he was pecked badly by my EEs and got really bad before we knew what was wrong. we gave him the vitamin treatments plus prednisone and he got better. This time we think he may have hit his head in their new condo my husband built...it was two stories and though we taught them to go up and down we think he fell. We have since removed the stairs. We have him back on the vitamins and prednisone since last night. He is worse when he's tired at night and first thing in the morning. My husband says he seems fine all day long and then starts curling his head in at night.

I hope yours rebounds as well!

 

[buggie30]

Well she still has the symptoms especially when startled, but does seem to get around just fine. I initially cut her down to one drop of the polyvisol for a few days and she got worse, spending the majority of her day twisted up. She is currently on 3 drops of polyvisol day with 2 drops of vitamin E with selenium every other. I am concerned about giving her the polyvisol on a regular basis. I also gave the flock some electrolytes in their water. She is eating and drinking just fine and is doing fine with the other chicks. A couple of the hens try to chase her around but she does a good job keeping away. My hens free range during the day and the chicks are penned so they are separated for the majority of the day. I also put a baby gate up for some protection for the chicks to get away from the hens while in the coop. She is the only chick that doesn't roost on the gate. I think that's a good thing seeing if she had an episode she'd roll right off. Well I guess at this point it's all trial and error. Any other suggestions are greatly appreciated.