Wry Neck in an adult chicken

[survivorchick]

Has anyone had an adult chicken that has survived wry neck? I have been syringe feeding her with Poly-vi-sol, vitamin E and prednisone that I crushed and diluted with water. She is not eating and starting having occasional seizures a couple of days ago. Trying to decide whether or not to euthinize. She was either attacked or had an episode in the run 2 1/2 weeks ago and started looking ill a few days later. It took me about a week to finally figure out what was wrong. She is separated from my other girls and looks so sad.

 

[casportpony]

Has anyone had an adult chicken that has survived wry neck? I have been syringe feeding her with Poly-vi-sol, vitamin E and prednisone that I crushed and diluted with water. She is not eating and starting having occasional seizures a couple of days ago. Trying to decide whether or not to euthinize. She was either attacked or had an episode in the run 2 1/2 weeks ago and started looking ill a few days later. It took me about a week to finally figure out what was wrong. She is separated from my other girls and looks so sad.

I had one... Took about two weeks of tube feeding, but she recovered and lived another seven years. If you want to learn how to tube, I can teach you.

-Kathy

 

[survivorchick]

I had one... Took about two weeks of tube feeding, but she recovered and lived another seven years. If you want to learn how to tube, I can teach you.

-Kathy

Please Kathy! I don't know if I can get a tube down her though. her neck is pretty severely bent outward. I am giving her three drops of poly-vi-sol mixed in a syringe of water, vitamin E 400mg. And approx. 1 mg. Prednisone twice a day. Should I add selenium or any thing else? What foods can I tube feed? I'm afraid she may aspirate food if I try to give it to her with a syringe.

 

[casportpony]

Is he eating and drinking at all?

-Kathy

 

[survivorchick]

She's actually doing a little better today. She ate some pellets, sunflower seeds, dried mealworms and chopped zucchini. I haven't seen her drink yet, but I syringe fed her a little water earlier. Should I change or add anything to what I'm doing already?

 

[animalgrl]

I believe I have an adult chicken who has this. She got up on the roof of the coop and when I went out at night and tried to get her down to put her in the coop, she started flapping, I lost my grip on her and she slid head first down the side of the metal roof into a chain link fence on the other side. I thought she was fine until I noticed a few days later that she wasn't eating. Took her to a vet (on Monday) a week after the incident and the vet said it is a neck injury. Her head position looks a lot like the chicken in the picture. I have her on pain medication and the vet said to massage her neck gently upward twice a day to try to get her to extend her neck. I've been doing that for the past two days, but she seems to have mostly stopped eating and I'm not sure how much she is drinking. I'm a bit afraid to try to feed her or give her water, because she seems to have some difficulty swallowing, and I'm afraid she will aspirate. Are the chances of recovering from something like this good? How long does recovery usually take? I'm quite worried about her and feeling quite guilty as I feel like it is my fault she got injured.

 

[survivorchick]

I'm sorry to say that after weeks of trying to save my 1-year old hen, my husband finally had to put her out of her misery. I think she also ran into a chain link fence after being attacked by something, possibly one of the other chickens.I only wish now that I hadn't let her suffer that long. She started having seizures and I knew that she probably wouldn't make it. We don't have any Vets that treat chickens where I live. I hope you have better luck than I did.

 

[animalgrl]

I'm sorry to hear about your girl. That's too bad. I hope I have better luck, too! It's been one thing after another with this particular chicken, (who is also a year old) and after all we've done to get her through her various ailments so far, I'd hate to lose her to this. She doesn't seem to be eating, though, and I'm not sure if she is drinking. I made up some electrolyte/probiotic/vitamin water this morning and got a fair amount into her one drop at a time. I know it isn't enough water, but I figure something is better than nothing. I think I'll try to pulverize some baby food with water tonight and see if I can get any of that into her. She is producing droppings, however the droppings she produced yesterday were a strange color - really dark green - like the color of green food coloring. When I first saw them my first thought was "how did drops of paint get in this bedding." I'm not sure what that means, but I'm really keeping my fingers crossed she improves.

 

[animalgrl]

Unfortunately, Cuckoo didn't make it. Friday she couldn't stand and Saturday we tried to medicate her and she started breathing heavily through an open beak. Found a vet who specializes in birds and he took one look at her and basically said she was in the process of dying and there was nothing else we could do. We had to euthanize her. The vet doesn't think it was a neck injury at all. Thinks we may be dealing with something viral, so now I'm worried about my other girls, though they all seem fine at this point.

 

[Nambroth]

I had one... Took about two weeks of tube feeding, but she recovered and lived another seven years. If you want to learn how to tube, I can teach you.

-Kathy

Kathy, did you end up doing anything other than tubing your wry neck patient? My (almost) 5-year-old hen developed serious wry neck overnight last week. I strongly suspect a head or neck injury. We went to a very good avian vet and did a complete gamut of testing to the tune of a few hundred dollars (I know I'm a nutcase but this is my special Derperella). The only problem we found was her blood chemistry panel suggested possible muscular or neurological injury. We've got her on Metacam (anti-inflammatory/pain) and vitamin supplements. She eats and drinks like a little pig so no problems there. Her head is nearly upside-down when she is relaxed, though.