One of my Silkie chickens has been tilting her head, and today I took it out of the coop and lightly set it down, and she fell over. But it's not a light little head tilt, it's been all over the place! What do you think it is, and how should I help her get better?
It sounds to me like she's got a vitamin deficiency. How old is she and what do you feed them? It may not be anything she's eating or not eating as sometimes the best fed silkies will get neurological or other vitamin deficiency issues.
What we do is give both Vitamin E and B-Complex.
If she's a chick, half these dosages as this is for an adult silkie, and these are human pills:
400 iu/lb Vit E.
1/2 B-Complex
Follow this up with a little scrambled eggs. Eggs have enough selenium in them to help the E absorb better.
If you have the gel caps of Vit E, you could try mixing it or half, depending on age, into some mash, which is water mixed into their crumbles. It's much easier if she's an adult, to just pop it in her mouth, as she may not like eating it mixed in feed as it tastes nasty.
Continue this for about two weeks and reevaluate if she's better and/or if you should continue. I've had a few lose most of the symptoms, but Charlotte is about 5 years old still with the head shakes. She gets a little extra E too, most of the time, which does seem to help.
