Kurai passed away today after I got home. 
She was very limp, not moving except to gasp or lift her head up when I gave her sugar water. She then started having "seizures" - curling her head onto her back. My friend says that once that starts, they will die. She was right! I picked up the phone and called her to ask for advice to perk up the chicks, and just as she told me to mix honey with warm water to give to them, I noticed that Kurai was no longer moving, and was already stiff in my hand. I quickly mixed up some "miracle juice", that she said that the hatchery suggested it to bring them back from borderlining death, and gave some to the remaining two chicks.
The reason they were so weak as well was for two reasons I believe. One, there was not enough heat (I fixed that problem and now stays about 95 in there), and two, they hadn't figured out how to eat. I had tried EVERYTHING to get them to eat - including tapping the feed to encourage pecking (what normally works), then force-feeding them (more like trying to fit a couple crumbles in their beaks, but they spit them out). I left for about an hour and a half to a 4-H meeting (talked with my 4-H leader and friends about everything), and when I got back, they are now perky! In'ei has even started pecking at the food (YAY!!!), but Yoru mainly still wants to sleep. He is perky when not asleep, but I have noticed something strange that I've never experienced before: he's mute! He seems to be peeping, but instead he makes a raspy whisper. (???)
I will get a refund for the dead chick, and any that die before 9:00 tomorrow morning, when my 4-H leader will call the hatchery and report all the losses. Apparently several others from this order have died as well, so it wasn't all my fault that they were doing so bad. They said that McMurray has been having a hard time with the hatch this year, as the last order that came in January also lost about half the chicks. Anyone else have problems with them this year?
Grr, if it wasn't for school (coming home at 5 in the afternoon), I might have been able to catch Kurai in the early stages and saved her.
She was very limp, not moving except to gasp or lift her head up when I gave her sugar water. She then started having "seizures" - curling her head onto her back. My friend says that once that starts, they will die. She was right! I picked up the phone and called her to ask for advice to perk up the chicks, and just as she told me to mix honey with warm water to give to them, I noticed that Kurai was no longer moving, and was already stiff in my hand. I quickly mixed up some "miracle juice", that she said that the hatchery suggested it to bring them back from borderlining death, and gave some to the remaining two chicks.The reason they were so weak as well was for two reasons I believe. One, there was not enough heat (I fixed that problem and now stays about 95 in there), and two, they hadn't figured out how to eat. I had tried EVERYTHING to get them to eat - including tapping the feed to encourage pecking (what normally works), then force-feeding them (more like trying to fit a couple crumbles in their beaks, but they spit them out). I left for about an hour and a half to a 4-H meeting (talked with my 4-H leader and friends about everything), and when I got back, they are now perky! In'ei has even started pecking at the food (YAY!!!), but Yoru mainly still wants to sleep. He is perky when not asleep, but I have noticed something strange that I've never experienced before: he's mute! He seems to be peeping, but instead he makes a raspy whisper. (???)
I will get a refund for the dead chick, and any that die before 9:00 tomorrow morning, when my 4-H leader will call the hatchery and report all the losses. Apparently several others from this order have died as well, so it wasn't all my fault that they were doing so bad. They said that McMurray has been having a hard time with the hatch this year, as the last order that came in January also lost about half the chicks. Anyone else have problems with them this year?
Grr, if it wasn't for school (coming home at 5 in the afternoon), I might have been able to catch Kurai in the early stages and saved her.
