Thiamine

[True Patriot]

Thanks! My DH looked at me like I was nuts when I got the bottle out and told him what I was going to do. I still can't believe it made a difference.

Sometimes taking a chance is better than no chance. I've been seeing a lot of your posts. I want to thank you for all the time and effort you put into helping everyone.

 

[Tesumph]

Not sure if this is a stupid question, but what are the main differences between paralysis and ataxia caused by thiamine deficiency vs. mareks? Could thiamine deficiency kill an entire flock or is that not likely? What would be the final death symptoms of a deficiency?

 

[Tesumph]

To further explain.. I had a flock several years ago that was wiped out. I thought I had documentation but the video is so bad it’s not worth posting. The first symptom was sitting on the hocks, like this: (not my photo). Sometimes just one leg out before the other followed. Then the bird would lose balance, act disoriented, ataxia got worse and worse. Wings would start dropping like they couldn’t hold them up. I vaguely remember some bubbly nostrils/eyes but not 100% on that. General listlessness and maybe runny poop. I think a couple birds died on their own (we tried to isolate, didn’t work), and eventually we started euthanizing as soon as paralysis started to try and stop the whole flock being wiped out. This all happened just before point of lay, because we got only a handful of eggs from the two survivors before raccoons took them.

10 out of 12 birds died from this within two weeks. They were fed dumor grower, I think. They were kept in a barn and did not get nearly enough sunlight (I was young and stupid). Is there ANY chance this was a freak vitamin deficiency or does this sound like classic mereks?

 

[ronott1]

I've read that large doses of amprolium for longer than two weeks can cause a thiamine deficiency, but I have not seen anything on medicated feed causing it.

I have seen it--The feed was not formulated correctly. Medicated feed has extra thiamine in it. The feed producer did not add enough. The chicks died and there was a recall.

This is one reason why I do not trust the medicated feed

 

[ronott1]

I started this thread because I had a chick hatch out yesterday that I came *very* close to euthanizing. Little thing, maybe 30 grams and it looked worse than this:
View attachment 1414510

and it kept flipping onto it's back like this:
View attachment 1414509

The link I posted in post #1 says this:
View attachment 1414512

So I threw the Hail Mary pass and gave the chick an injection of B complex. And would you believe that in less than an hour the chick was looking normal?

This was a first for me and I have no idea why this happened, but maybe the hen that laid this egg didn't get enough thiamine? Anyway, in hindsight, I really wish I had taken pictures of it before the injection.

Was it your hen?

 

[casportpony]

Was it your hen?

Yes, and her other chicks are okay.

 

[casportpony]

Anytime I get one with some sort of ataxia or paralysis, especially that age, I assume Marek's, but so many other things can look like Marek's so I will usually try treating for those first. It's been my experience that people don't usually lose a large percentage to Marek's, and I think @ronott1 might have more info on this.

 

[casportpony]

I have seen it--The feed was not formulated correctly. Medicated feed has extra thiamine in it. The feed producer did not add enough. The chicks died and there was a recall.

This is one reason why I do not trust the medicated feed

Was this in California?

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

My experiences have been Mareks is hit and miss, and I have only seen one in a batch if I see any. If multiple young birds showed symptoms I would think it was something else.

 

[Tesumph]

Yea, I guess that’s why I’m so confused. I keep reading conflicting information. People who definitely know what they’re talking about say there’s a very low mortality rate, others say it’s a total death sentence.. when I was looking for a picture of a chicken with the same paralysis as mine, all of them were labeled as mereks symptoms and whatnot. It doesn’t really matter, it was years ago and we’ve moved since then, it’s just the inner knowledge bug in me that wants to know.

If it wasn’t a very nasty strain of mereks, based on the symptoms I described, what would be the most obvious next choices for you guys?