Crooked Beak.. injury or defect?

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Nyrial

Nyrial

Songster
10 Years
Aug 4, 2009
547
2
129
Lake Stevens, WA
So I was moving my chicks around today and my poor little Houdan has a crookedish beak. Is it growing incorrectly, or a possible injury from the bigger chicks? I haven't seen any aggression issues, and they all eat and sleep together.

He/She seems to be eating and drinking just fine, and gaining weight with the rest of the chicks. So I'm tempted to leave it alone, unless there is something I can do. I tried pulling them in line together, but it peeps really loud and then it just displaces again. I've looked at the other posts with the "crooked beak search" some say cull, others' birds sound/seemed to be doing ok..

I don't have a livestock vet yet, does anyone in the Everett/ Lake Stevens/Snohomish WA area have one they can recommend?

Here is a pic...

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I think it's a growth abnormality.
I guess if you're wanting the chick for a pet and not for show or breeding stock, what's the harm in keeping it if it's still healthy?

I say keep her and see how it goes. If needed you could always cull it later IF needed. I mean if it got to looking poorly and ill.

Good luck
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Yes, I'm planning on just keeping him/her as a pet/layer if I'm lucky enough that she's a pullet. It doesn't appear to be in any pain, I'm just going to keep an eye on it and see what happens. This also justifies feeding more special mashes to them. Any excuse for spoilage..
 
They often need a deep feed dish so they can scoop the feed up. Just don't breed him/her; it is usually considered to be genetic; it is usually a skull deformity.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Cross beaks are genetic defects. Do not use as a breeder bird but they can survive alot of times and not starve out if you deep dish feed them and watch to make sure they are not losing weight.
 
I have a "crooked beaked" chicken...she is a buckeye and is doing GREAT! I thought about culling her before I read about feeding her out of a deep dish. Glad I didn't, as she is bigger than most of my other girls and laying eggs just fine. I had a deep dish with feed for my geese and she tends to eat out of there and gets her water out of one of the deeper buckets. All is well. I think she is a bit odd at times, as I saw her putting pine shavings (one at a time!) on her back yesterday. Not sure what that is all about...but she walked out of the coop and the other hens started pecking it off her. Maybe that is her way of getting groomed! (I think I am giving her too much credit). Good luck and I would just wait and see how it goes
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I also have a crooked beak chicken. She is a sixteen week old EE. As she grew older, her deformity grew more severe. She has been able to keep up with her sisters though, and eats well from a typical hanging feeder and drinks from the flock waterer. I have read that it may grow even more severe as she ages, and if the time comes when she does not thrive feeding with the others, we will have to decide whether to hand feed (very time consuming) or cull. Hopefully yours will grow as well.
 
I had 2 Crossbeaks one a Silkie and another a Silver Sebright. They did fine the only reason the silkie died was because she got sick. I would keep the chick as long as you have a deep dish for her she should be fine with the eating. Edward acts completly normal showing off to the girls and everything.
 

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