I have a 10 month old silkie and last month she became broody for about two weeks. She doesn’t usually eat or drink when she is broody and I try to force her but she doesn’t eat or drink a lot. When she got up she was walking crooked and looking drunk like. She was walking towards the left and her left wing was drooped on the left side. I thought it was going to go away until I saw it was getting worse the next day. When I saw her not able to get up anymore I rushed her to an emergency vet. They did box X-rays, blood work, vitamin b12 injection, and iv fluids. $1500 later the doctor thinks it’s Mareks. I told her I didn’t think so and I wasn’t going to give up on her. My bf and I separated her from the rest of the flock just in case. She wasn’t eating much or drinking I had to syringe it to her. The doctor emailed me the blood results and said, “KJ's CBC (complete blood count) did come back with a fairly elevated white blood cell count. This response is robust enough to be called an inflammatory leukogram and can be indicative of the body responding to something infectious. With that in mind, we could definitely start KJ on an antibiotic in addition to her other therapies to help cover the potential for bacterial infection. We can fill that medication through the hospital for pick-up with your approval.” I started her on clavamox and she also was on pain medication and a calcium supplement. After taking the antibiotics and calcium supplier after a week she was better. She was running around eating and drinking normally and I was so happy that she was better.
A month later she became broody again but only for a week. She seems worse now. Paralysis on her left side. Not wanting to eat or drink so I’m syringing her vitamins mixed in her water and syringing her feed mixed with water so I can force her to eat it. Sometimes at night she will eat from my hand. She will try to run to go lay in the coop but she falls over on her side. I put her on antibiotics again because I thought she had an infection and nothing helped after a week. I took her to her primary vet and she thinks she has hypocalcemia because of the paralysis and the twitching of her left leg. So I started to give her the calcium supplement again and it’s been 3-4 days and she’s not walking. She’s getting skinnier and I’m feeding her multiple times a day. Every time I look online for an answer it says it’s Mareks disease and it’s not. This is the second time it happened when she became broody. I tried giving her scrambled eggs and she doesn’t want it. I give her egg yolk and she doesn’t want it. I’ve tried yogurt and still no.
Please help me with what I can do. I’m not ready to give up on her she is apart of the family. Has this happened to anyone’s chicken before or know of anyone it has happened to? I will do anything for her to walk again and be back to normal.
A month later she became broody again but only for a week. She seems worse now. Paralysis on her left side. Not wanting to eat or drink so I’m syringing her vitamins mixed in her water and syringing her feed mixed with water so I can force her to eat it. Sometimes at night she will eat from my hand. She will try to run to go lay in the coop but she falls over on her side. I put her on antibiotics again because I thought she had an infection and nothing helped after a week. I took her to her primary vet and she thinks she has hypocalcemia because of the paralysis and the twitching of her left leg. So I started to give her the calcium supplement again and it’s been 3-4 days and she’s not walking. She’s getting skinnier and I’m feeding her multiple times a day. Every time I look online for an answer it says it’s Mareks disease and it’s not. This is the second time it happened when she became broody. I tried giving her scrambled eggs and she doesn’t want it. I give her egg yolk and she doesn’t want it. I’ve tried yogurt and still no.
Please help me with what I can do. I’m not ready to give up on her she is apart of the family. Has this happened to anyone’s chicken before or know of anyone it has happened to? I will do anything for her to walk again and be back to normal.
