Duckling Having Seizures

[55fingers]

A few hours ago we discovered one of our ducklings (supposedly pekin) on their back in our brooder, wet, looking dead, its legs twitching. It had been trampled on by its five siblings as they ran to drink from their fresh water. We took it out when we found it and dried it off, and held it in a towel. We were so absolutely sure that he was done for, and he looked barely alive. We waited for it to die, as it gasped for air, eyes glazing over, and threw its head back like ducks do when they die. This continued for around and hour. Then, miraculously, it survived, perked up, looked around, and started to peep.

It looks and acts almost completely normal now, except it is very wobbly. It is much more aware than it was a few hours ago, and its eyes are bright instead of glazed over, and it's eating.

However, every few minutes, it has "seizures". It throws its head back, like it did when we thought it was dying, and flips and spins around. It looks almost exactly like the below video.

(Does not belong to me, credit to the video owner)

I'm thinking it might be some sort of head damage, or at least internal damage from being trampled on constantly. There are no external wounds, but we can see a little blood through (inside) his beak and on his mouth.

What can we do for him? He is constantly wobbly, but he can stand up, and he is just as aware as the other ducklings. We are going to separate him from his siblings, but what else is there to do? I'm fairly confident it is not a niacin deficiency. Having seizures every few minutes isn't a very good way to live, but we'll keep him as a special needs duck if we have to. We already have one disabled duck who lives in the house with us, but I worry that this one is in pain. Is there anything we can give him? If it's internal or head damage, will it heal by itself? Thank you for any help!

 

[Eggcessive]

Are you using a poultry vitamin, such as NutriDrench or Poultry Cell? I would at least try one that contains, thiamine, vitamin E, and selenium. If you have another that does not have selenium, then give some chopped egg daily.

It sounds neurological, possibly seizure activity, but I would try the vitamins in case of thiamine or E deficiency. If you will, also post on the duck thread as well for others more experinced with ducks.

 

[Kimmyh51]

Does anyone know the outcome here? I have a duckling in a similar condition out of the blue.

 

[Eggcessive]

Does anyone know the outcome here? I have a duckling in a similar condition out of the blue.

Can you give more details and the age? Do you have any electrolytes or vitamins? If not, offer a little sugar water now. What are you feeding? Was it hurt? I will tag @Miss Lydia who knows more about ducks than I do.

 

[Kimmyh51]

Can you give more details and the age? Do you have any electrolytes or vitamins? If not, offer a little sugar water now. What are you feeding? Was it hurt? I will tag @Miss Lydia who knows more about ducks than I do.

Hi, i had already done all that, it was fed game bird crumble (only duckling feed avail here in NZ), given fluids, and given avian electrolytes, plus additional b vitamins.

It died a few mins ago. All of the symptoms and signs pointed to heavy metal toxicity, but its been raised indoors in a container with other ducklings and not been outside at all except the first 2-3 days after it hatched before it and its mother lost each other.

Am a bit baffled as to what has happened as it came on out of the blue with no reasons i can figure. Another similar age duckling in the same brooder with it had a respiratory infection so both were on oxytetracycline for that, the duckling with the resp. infection is recovered and the one that died never really got the infection. 3 other slightly older ducks were with them till 5 days ago when they went into an outdoor brooder run full tine. They are all fine.

Am going to attempt a necropsy after i get some sleep, mainly to check there is nothing in its GI system. I can't imagine how there could possibly be, but need to set my mind at rest on that as the symptoms were so much like heavy metal poisoning. (Anemic/pale mucus membranes, loss of balance/coordination, tremors, etc, all looking very similar to the couple of ducks I've seen in the past with heavy metal toxicity).