UPDATE with Pic! Hen walking in circles with head at extreme angle

[TwoChicks]

My light brahma hen has developed these symptoms:

Walking upright and balanced in circles, but not in place spinning circles. Big wide ground covering circles at normal chicken moving pace.

Her head/neck seems to be at a 90degree angle to her body, definately not upright and she seems to try to straighten it, but it kind of moves around in a circular fashion and remains sideways with her eye pointing upwards. (Willget some pictures now and post in a few minutes.

She's in a large coop with 17 other girls and one rooster. She (and the other light brahma) are the largest in the flock, at 7 months old.

Any ideas?

 

[MissJenny]

It sounds like wry neck -- it's a vitamin deficiency, you can look this up on the search engine at the upper right corner. Do you have children's liquid poly-vi-sol without iron. Add this to her water several times a day. There are other specific vitamins to use -- one of the B vitamins and vitamin E liquid capsule, pricked and squirted in the mouth or drizzled on the beak. If it's wry neck she should be fine in a few days of treatment. My best to both of you.

Jenny

 

[Kittymomma]

Might be wry neck. I haven't had it here, but it sounds like some of the threads I've read. I believe it's a vitamin deficiency and is usually treated with polyvisol (infant vitamins), be sure to get the kind WITHOUT iron. Hopefully someone who has personal experience with this will chime in soon. I would seperate her from the rest of the flock though. Not so much for quarantine which would be pretty pointless since she grew up with them, but for her own protection and so you can tell how much she's eating/drinking/pooping etc.

 

[TwoChicks]

I have some short video I'm uploading to youtube.

She evidently does walk backwards as well. (Video shows this).

Any thoughts?

 

[TwoChicks]

Well, I went to CVS and got her some Poly vi-sol and gave her some by dropper which she willingly drank. She IMMEDIATELY seemed better and was able to hold her head more upright enough to eat some crumbles and mash. I could only get her to drink very sparingly, so that's when I decided to make a watery mash for her and she seemed to be ok with munching that up.

Keeping all the other girls and Titus away was a job, but I think the LB got plenty.

I hope to have more good news tomorrow.

 

[TwoChicks]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A32yyv1-OLc

Here's one of the videos.

 

[MissJenny]

Hooray -- glad to hear she is improving -- amazing what a little vitamin will do. I wouldn't recommend separating for any time more than making sure she eats as integrating back into the flock can be very difficult (I say, with a separated hen sitting on my knee as her former flock-mates now don't want her with them.)

Please keep us posted on her condition.

Jenny

 

[TwoChicks]

UPDATE!!

My brahma hen surprised me yesterday by being almost completely recovered from what I was SURE would be fatal. I opened the coop and all the others came running out and I noticed she was up higher than usual (she's been sitting on the floor for the last couple weeks). She was perched on the side of a nesting box and her head was completely upright!

I woo-hoo'd and yay'd and all that stuff ... then she hopped up on the step-over and sat for awhile balancing herself and then came outside to scratch with the rest of the flock. She was even running around some! All normal. She still has a very teensy bit of it, but is 1000% better!!!

I did like suggested and gave her half dropper full of Vitasol (no iron) or as much as she would take, and made her a warm mash of her chicken crumbles and water so I knew she was getting some liquid.

Even with her neck at the extreme angles, she was eating and drinking from the feeder and waterer by herself. But, I continued with the mash because I wanted to give her some special attention, which of course, made all the hens want some special attention, so now I have 18 BFF's and one ticked off rooster that I stole his hens. That is until he gets some mash, too. Titus *begrudgingly* eats it though.


Here is my light brahma girl before and after. Whew!! This list is a LIFESAVER - she can attest to that.

Before:

After: