Curved Beaks?

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Mosey2003

Mosey2003

Crowing
7 Years
Apr 13, 2016
3,243
5,393
431
North-Central IL
Hi there!

I bought my first six chicks ever on February 15th. Buff Orpingtons from a private breeder, he claimed they were of English lines and vastly superior to hatchery chickens, I paid twice what the stores charge. Now that they're over a month old, I'm noticing their beaks are almost all crooked. Top and bottom, curved around to one side, not like a scissor. He also gave me a free one that hatched with only one wing.

What gives? Are these inbred chickens?
 
I would love to see a picture of the bird with only one wing! and I know a breeder who breeds to SOP for a different breeds and he has issues all the time since hes kinda careless. I would assume that similarly to fancy dog breeds/breeders the puppies/chicks would end up with little quirks such as that. Nonetheless the beaks can be helped by trimming, do you have photos?
 
My friend is going to try to take a good photo tonight, so I can update with it. They're living in my friend's brooder because I kind of put the cart before the horse
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The One Winged Wonder looks completely normal, just only has one wing. I can't even tell which one it is, honestly.

I plan on fermenting crumbles when they move to my house in a couple weeks, so they should be able to eat that well. They didn't appear crooked until a couple weeks ago, but it seems to be worsening. They've been on normal chick crumbles, no supplements or anything funky. Hopefully it doesn't get really bad by the time they're full-grown.
 
That guy is not a breeder. He is a peddler. Entire line needs to be culled. No breeder would let a chick go with a defect. No breeder would turn out an entire group with crooked beak. A breeder would have culled the line. A breeder would have culled a chick missing a wing.There is nothing salvageable there. Instead, this guy is passing defective junk off to unsuspecting people as high dollar breeding stock. I doubt you will be able to get your money back, but don't buy anything else from him. And don't breed them.
 
That is not good. This not a great way to start this hobby. What I had happened to me, was in the beginning, the one I had did fine at first, and I really didn't notice it at first, but it grew much worse, just as you describe. She got along just fine, was keeping up with the others, and then, the bird did not seem to be able to eat enough to support the bird. All at once (it seemed) the other babies were much bigger than she was, and she was way too thin. She died shortly.

Really this is going to be hard, but I think these should be culled. These are major deformities.

Mrs K
 
Well... I think I'll give trimming the beaks a shot first and see if the worst one can eat better after. If not, I'll have to start culling :'(

I'm really disappointed. The man lied and said he's never had a bad beak, when I know I saw him list a cross beak Wyandotte for free after I had already bought my chicks. Then he said it's my fault for feeding chick starter, as he only feeds 20% protein feed. Obviously, he thinks I'm stupid. Offered me free chicks and acted like he was doing me an enormous favor; I declined.
 

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