Please help - entire batch of chicks dying suddenly - TWICE

[KRack]

Be very careful of the water you give them!
Never use tap water, for the very same reason we as humans rarely drink water straight from the tap. You don’t need to give your chickens Bottled water, but you do need to let the tap water rest for a day before giving it to the chicks. You can speed up this process by either boiling the water or putting it out in the sun, which dissipates the chlorine and other impurities in tap water.
I’ve never used electrolytes and I’ve never experienced the problem you’ve described.
But we all know how bad tap water is. Let it rest for several hours and dissipate.
Older chickens will have no problem with tap water, but these are babies!

She has well water. You wouldn’t drink well water from the tap? We get ours tested annually, and drink it right from the faucet. Thankful to be off city water!

 

[FunClucks]

Be very careful of the water you give them!
Never use tap water, for the very same reason we as humans rarely drink water straight from the tap. You don’t need to give your chickens Bottled water, but you do need to let the tap water rest for a day before giving it to the chicks. You can speed up this process by either boiling the water or putting it out in the sun, which dissipates the chlorine and other impurities in tap water.
I’ve never used electrolytes and I’ve never experienced the problem you’ve described.
But we all know how bad tap water is. Let it rest for several hours and dissipate.
Older chickens will have no problem with tap water, but these are babies!

Water quality can be a real issue, there are a number of ways to filter it at home if you're concerned. Testing the water is the best way to see what you have. Also, in the USA, municipal sources are required by law to tell folks the water testing results once a year, so it may be on the water supplier website. (of course you have to trust they're telling the truth...)

That being said, I drink my tap water all the time. If I travel I drink bottled water though, as tap water in other places can make me sick. I think it depends entirely on the quality of the tap water you're drinking and what you're used to.

I feed my chicks tap water all the time and have never had issues. But I also drink it myself with no problems. It's true that if you let it rest for several days some of the chlorine can leave, but the time of resting depends on what chemicals they use in it when treating it. In addition, if I'm filling a non-disposable water bottle from my tap, I want to use chlorinated water from the tap. After three days, once a lot of the chlorine has left, more bacteria will grow if the water bottle gets hot, and I can get sick from it. So I use fresh chlorinated or filtered water every day, and don't let it sit around in the heat.

 

[countrybumpkin5]

Be very careful of the water you give them!
Never use tap water, for the very same reason we as humans rarely drink water straight from the tap. You don’t need to give your chickens Bottled water, but you do need to let the tap water rest for a day before giving it to the chicks. You can speed up this process by either boiling the water or putting it out in the sun, which dissipates the chlorine and other impurities in tap water.
I’ve never used electrolytes and I’ve never experienced the problem you’ve described.
But we all know how bad tap water is. Let it rest for several hours and dissipate.
Older chickens will have no problem with tap water, but these are babies!

Tap water meaning municipal water that has been treated with chemicals. Well water, unless a very shallow well with chemical runoff, should be fine.
One problem with letting water sit outside this time of year is the heat, depending on location. Yes, chlorine will dissipate, but many cities are now using chloramines instead which has different properties. An easy fix for chlorine is to add a bit of ascorbic acid or sodium ascorbate to the water. Easy to do for yourself as well, especially for bathing (a bath not a shower obviously) if you don't want to soak in chlorine. There is a lot of info on this as many conservation agencies and other businesses that use a lot of water for animals do this. Many also use silver for an algaecide, etc. It takes very little ascorbic acid and works very quickly, and it's very inexpensive. With having tiny chicks and only a few you will not be going through a lot of water at this point so about anything you do will be relatively easy and inexpensive. I have not, and will not, drink chlorinated water in decades. I am on a rural water system that luckily does not fluoridate the water but they do use chlorine and will really up the dose every time we get a rain which is ludicrous but they do it anyway. I use a Berkey for all my cooking and drinking and my dog, and for the feral cats when I can keep up, otherwise they get the rural water. All that said, your problem is not the water nor the feed as many have pointed out. The sudden deaths of them all simply wouldn't be the result.

 

[chickeyumass]

Organic Mom, thanks for the reply. One thing is that they were actually in two different areas of the house when this happened. First batch was on the main floor and second batch was in our finished basement.

We do have a radon system installed in the house and had the radon levels tested when we bought it a few years ago and all tests were within normal spec.

A deep clean of the room is a good idea. We will be sure to do that before introducing any more chicks to the house.

The idea to buy pullets is a good one. I have though about that but unfortunately I have not found a reputable source around me for them. Most of the availability I see is on craigslist which I am not totally against. We don't see too many pullets in the breeds we are interested in.

So sorry for your losses. I am also new to chicks and from Mass. Got my chicks from koopscoops in Westport, MA. Brooke has pullets. I used a pop up puppy pen from Amazon. I have town water but use a pitcher filter for drinking and filtered baby chick water as well. I used the same organic feed as you. Mine were in the attached garage with a heat plate.
KoopsCoops.com

My only idea is static electricity. Those totes and the wire surround in a dry room, with the vacuum.

 

[countrybumpkin5]

That being said, I drink my tap water all the time. If I travel I drink bottled water though, as tap water in other places can make me sick. I think it depends entirely on the quality of the tap water you're drinking and what you're used to.

I'm sure you already know, but some may not. Most bottled water is simply tap water with a high price, and then you also have the extreme toxicity of the plastic bottle. If one is drinking proven filtered spring water in a glass bottle then that's different. Most people, however, think buying water in a plastic bottle that has a label which makes it sound "healthy" think they are getting something other than what they actually are.

 

[Iowajones]

I am having a very strange and troubling problem with keeping chicks alive (this has been my first attempt at chickens). I have had 2 different batches of chicks (two batches ocurring at two different times) all die within minutes of each other.

My brooder is a clear 100 quart tote with the cover cut out and 1/2” hardware cloth attached to that opening. I have a brooder plate for heat from Brinsea. The chick waterer and feeder are the style you can screw a mason jar into however it came with plastic bottles so I used those. Feeder and waterer were cleaned mornings and evenings of whatever they managed to get into them and topped off. We started with paper towels the first two days and then switched to pine shavings after that with both batches.

The first batch (mailed to me) was 6 Rhode Island Reds (ordered vaccinated for Mareks and coccidiosis). They were fed unmedicated chick starter from Grubbly Farms (Little Pecks I belive it’s called) and I added electrolyte to their water upon arrival. I lost two within 48 hours and spoke to the hatchery and explained my setup and was told it was a great setup. The remaining 4 seemed to be doing great after that. About a week later while vacuuming in the same room I noticed chaos in the brooder. Two of the chicks seemed to be actively dying (convulsing) and the other two seemed to be breathing heavily and lethargic. All chicks expired within about 3 minutes of each other. They seemed perfectly fine 10 minutes prior the last time I had walked past the brooder and put eyes on them. I frantically researched what it could be but came up with nothing. I thought that I may quite literally scared them to death when I started the vacuum in the same room.

Fast forward a few weeks and we received 10 chicks in the mail from a different hatchery (not because we were unhappy with the first but because of the availability of breeds). These were three Rhode Island Reds, four Plymouth Barred Rocks, and three Australorps. These were not vaccinated for anything. They were given electrolyte added to their water upon their arrival and were also fed the Little Pecks chick starter that we had leftover. These chicks seemed to thrive more than the last batch I had which is all I had to compare it to. They seemed generally livelier and seemed to grow a little more in their first week compared to the last batch of Rhode Island Reds. After 2 weeks we felt the plastic tote was beginning to get tight so we moved them to a plastic kiddie pool surrounded by 1/2” hardware cloth and added a chick roosting bar thingy for them to play on. They seemed to love this new area hopping up on everything they could. During this time the Little Pecks starter feed started to run low so we purchased a bag of Nature’s Best organic chick starter/grower from Tractor Supply. I took what was left of the Little Pecks and added about an equal amount of the new feed to it to start transitioning them over. That was about a week ago. They finished the mix in a few days and were fed the Nature’s Best since. Tonight while watching a movie in the same room we heard some commotion and checked on the chicks, assuming they knocked over their waterer or something. Instead we find two of the chicks convulsing. I tried to grab their waterer and add some electrolyte to it in a desperate attempt to save the remaining chicks but then a couple more died a minute later, a few more and within 10-15 minutes they were all gone. They seemed to have gone a similar way as the first batch. We were hanging out watching them for a bit before we put on a movie and they were jumping around playing on their playscape. Like the last batch, nothing seemed amiss. It may be worth mentioning we never had any cases of pasty butt on either batch.

At this point I am totally at a loss as to what is going on or what I am doing wrong. Does anybody have any insight? I tried to include as many details as I could but please let me know if I left some out. I’m sure I did.

I'm a biochemist and backyard chicken keeper. This is definitely a poison. Scented candles especially the wood wicks are toxic. Is the food dry? You kept heat in the pool brooder?
If it were me I would clean all equipment w clorox, chicks no where near! Rinse and leave a couole hours. Go get regular food, not organic, the price is different to not add nutrients and some "organic" nutrients are hard to digest.
There has been a huge issue w TSC improperly storing feed and whole hatcheries loosing their flocks.
Bedding, you need straw or Large! Large! horse bedding wood chips.
If the chicks ate their bedding they will die suddenly.
Smoke from cigarettes is deadly.
Another person mentioned Teflon, teflon is a non reactive chemical unless heated to 300°F (the old teflon, that's never used anymore).
Most common issues,
Drafts of cool air
Bedding too small and chicks eat it
Toxins in the feed.

 

[bhwms]

Thanks for everyone’s responses today. I’m also thinking an environmental change. Not sure what it could be, though.
To answer a few questions, the oil heat is the regular furnace for me house. In the summer it only comes on to heat my hot water heater.
Also, the vacuum we have is a battery powered Dyson. Nothing plugged in at the time of use. Only when on the charger.
We do have a carbon monoxide detector in that room. My six year old son loves to test it as regular preventative maintenance so I’m confident it works.
Anyways, moving forward I think the plan is to brood right in the chicken coop. I’m going to walk off a section of it and run an extension cord out for heat. We are going to be using a different brand of pine shavings and using bottled water instead of well water. I’m feeling confident this next batch will work out for us.

I really appreciate all the help and advice everyone has offered.

For carbon monoxide, another poster already said: it is heavy and sinks to to floor. Where is your CO detector? I would temporarily move it to chick height and see if it goes off - standard troubleshooting is 3X MTBF (mean time between failure) so if they’ve been dying in say 3 days, then I would put it at chick level for 9 full days.

Alternatively, you can raise the level of the chicks brooder to table height.

Does your initial brooder have air holes drilled in the sides? If not, I would do that, and make sure you deburr the holes. If there is a heavier gas coming from above you want to give it a way to escape & not build up.

I hope you find the problem!

 

[akrafel]

I think it could be the electrolyte. Save a chick is for a sick chick with diarrhea not a healthy one. Too much salt might be causing heart problems. The convulsions suggest a cardiac arrest. Try plain water or a vitamin supplement like Rooster Booster instead.

 

[Windywoo]

I may have missed this if someone already noted it, I lost 2 different batches of chicks because they got overheated while I was setting up a larger cage to move them to. I waited too long to move them and they were crying, stretching and struggling, then they passed within minutes of each other. I left the heat lamp on while I was making the preparations. They were crowded and I didn't think about turning it off. It was heartbreaking. I had them on puppy pads with small votive glasses for food and water. They were all healthy .

 

[NatJ]

I may have missed this if someone already noted it, I lost 2 different batches of chicks because they got overheated while I was setting up a larger cage to move them to. I waited too long to move them and they were crying, stretching and struggling, then they passed within minutes of each other. I left the heat lamp on while I was making the preparations. They were crowded and I didn't think about turning it off. It was heartbreaking. I had them on puppy pads with small votive glasses for food and water. They were all healthy .

I don't think anyone had commented on that.

These particular chicks had a heat plate, and according to the photos they had plenty of unheated space around it, so we have all been assuming the temperature was fine. But you're right, temperature is an important point to consider too.