Wobbly chick

[jthurmann]

What happened to the chic? I am having the same issues - her legs are useless. It all occurred very quickly - overnight. The other 3 chicks we got at the same time are doing fine.

 

[petersonc]

Unfortunately, we had to put her to sleep. We tried vitamins and took her to the vet twice hoping it wasn't Marek's disease but it was. We made a sling for her to rest in until she began having trouble swallowing and the my husband had the task of putting her out of her misery.

I am sorry to hear about your chick.

 

[Lilchickmama]

I'm so sorry to hear about your little chick. That disease is the most devastating disease for chickens and for their owners. I lost one about a month ago to it....the day my husband culled him was a horrible, tear-filled day in our family.

Hopefully, neither of us will ever have to deal with that disease again.

 

[jthurmann]

He is still dying... It might be Marek's disease AND coccidiosis after all, since my other bigger chicks also got it, but they are fighting it very strong. The other bigger chicks are drinking, eating like crazy, but my little guy just got worse and worse. He perked up a little after being given Sulmet diluted in water for the coccidiosis. He responded 'miraculously' well in so far as he began eating manna and even yellow egg yolk boiled. But he still wasn't drinking and we had to force it down his throat with a dropper. But overnight, he got worse again even though I slept next to him and woke up every couple hours to try to get him to eat more or drink whenever he awoke. But his eyes were closed most of the time and now he wants nothing. He is dying indeed... I guess unless I take him to a chicken pathologist , I won't know for sure what happened. The coccidiosis is confirmed coz the others have the same symptoms (runny occassionally bloody stool, but like I say.... they are also being treated with the Sulmet solution diluted in water and I think / hope they will never get this bad. They are active, crazy, happy, eating, drinking, pecking, etc. The little guy , perhaps due to Marek's, couldn't fight Marek's and coccsidiosis so he is slowly resting his way to chick heaven. I am devastated, as is my family. I couldn't ever imagine that you can make a pet out of chicken, that you can love him in less than 3 weeks and that love for a bird can be that strong... Lesson learned for alll of us. Good luck to all reading this post. Remember to read about coccsidiosis, buy Sulmet -- it's a solution that comes in a 16 fl oz bottle and you dilute with water. It tells you dilution instructions for 16 gallons (ha ha) so if you have just a few chicks, you will have to do the math to get this diluted appropriately (too much can be toxic). In our case, I was making a fresh batch of water like this -- 16 fl oz of water with 4 ml of Sulmet. You can buy a small medicine dropper to tell how much 4 ml is. You add the 4ml to the 16fl oz of water and swish it around to mix. Then let the chicks drink it. Like I saw, this seems to be helping the other chicks because although they have the runny stools, they are fine in every other way, so I hope it gets rid of it. Oh, and one last thing... I suspect that this bacteria spread around because my chicks kept spilling their water into their brooder and the bacteria/protozoan will multiple in water. So I got a better way to give them water so that they do not spill it. Now their pine shavings in the brooder box are nice and dry, and I clean their brooder twice a day now, just until this thing passes. Good luck to all chicken lovers.

 

[jthurmann]

He is still dying... It might be Marek's disease AND coccidiosis after all, since my other bigger chicks also got it, but they are fighting it very strong. The other bigger chicks are drinking, eating like crazy, but my little guy just got worse and worse. He perked up a little after being given Sulmet diluted in water for the coccidiosis. He responded 'miraculously' well in so far as he began eating manna and even yellow egg yolk boiled. But he still wasn't drinking and we had to force it down his throat with a dropper. But overnight, he got worse again even though I slept next to him and woke up every couple hours to try to get him to eat more or drink whenever he awoke. But his eyes were closed most of the time and now he wants nothing. He is dying indeed... I guess unless I take him to a chicken pathologist , I won't know for sure what happened. The coccidiosis is confirmed coz the others have the same symptoms (runny occassionally bloody stool, but like I say.... they are also being treated with the Sulmet solution diluted in water and I think / hope they will never get this bad. They are active, crazy, happy, eating, drinking, pecking, etc. The little guy , perhaps due to Marek's, couldn't fight Marek's and coccsidiosis so he is slowly resting his way to chick heaven. I am devastated, as is my family. I couldn't ever imagine that you can make a pet out of chicken, that you can love him in less than 3 weeks and that love for a bird can be that strong... Lesson learned for alll of us. Good luck to all reading this post. Remember to read about coccsidiosis, buy Sulmet -- it's a solution that comes in a 16 fl oz bottle and you dilute with water. It tells you dilution instructions for 16 gallons (ha ha) so if you have just a few chicks, you will have to do the math to get this diluted appropriately (too much can be toxic). In our case, I was making a fresh batch of water like this -- 16 fl oz of water with 4 ml of Sulmet. You can buy a small medicine dropper to tell how much 4 ml is. You add the 4ml to the 16fl oz of water and swish it around to mix. Then let the chicks drink it. Like I saw, this seems to be helping the other chicks because although they have the runny stools, they are fine in every other way, so I hope it gets rid of it. Oh, and one last thing... I suspect that this bacteria spread around because my chicks kept spilling their water into their brooder and the bacteria/protozoan will multiple in water. So I got a better way to give them water so that they do not spill it. Now their pine shavings in the brooder box are nice and dry, and I clean their brooder twice a day now, just until this thing passes. Good luck to all chicken lovers.

 

[petersonc]

Where do I get Sulmet? I am soory about your chicken. We are learning to be tough when it comes to raising chickens.

 

[khgiant12]

I buy this at the farm supply store.

 

[jthurmann]

Just like the previous poster, I also bought Solmet at a farm supply store, the same place were i bought my chicks.

Update on my chick: The previous night, i was getting up to check on him but i wasn't forcing him to drink much because 1) i felt sad for shoving the dropper down his throat and 2) because i figured chicks need rest, too. But, in the morning yesterday, like i wrote above, he was nearly lifeless. I decided to start forcing him to drink 2 1/2-3 mL of Solmet-water solution every 1-2 hrs. Also, I was encouraging him to eat and checking to make sure he had pooped recently. I repeated this every 2 hrs at night...and he's improving. but this 5 week old chick only weighs prob. about 2 oz. hes still wobbly but can stand a little if his butt is propped up against the side of the shoebox. So, i am not sure what will happen but he did improve a little bit since i started this regimen.

bty: you have to treat your other chicks with the same solution as mentioned above; 2 of the 3 other chicks have that same runny stool as the sick one but are getting better since i was giving them a tiny bit of the solution, just not so much, so as not to overdose them because then it can become toxic.

good luck.. and remember, don't count your chickens before they heal!

 

[tamleah]

I've got a wobbly chick too - got 17 chicks in on the 14th of July - all are well except this one. She is wobbly - can stand up and walk for a minute but eventually seems to lose her balance - spends a lot of time on her hocks. Eating and drinking the same as the others. I've used poly vi sol vitamins and thought there was improvement at first - but now think she is worse. Not seeing any problem with the other chicks thankfully. I'm going to just keep trying and hope for the best - give her the best shot that I can.