- Apr 12, 2013
- 317
- 18
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I'm devastated tonight. It has been a roller coaster the past 2 days. I'll start by saying I love my broody Janet, and she did an excellent jobs hatching my eggs from rambob59...I don't know if any of this was her fault...I guess it's just one of those things that happen. Ok...so here's how it played out. We are having a heat wave in Kentucky...93°< for days now. When the 6 chicks were 3 days old (3 Goldens and 3 whites), I moved Janet and the chick's out to a shade tree in the yard for a little free ranging. I kept frozen gallons of water by the nest and around the yard. They had close access to fresh ice water and chick starter. For 2 days, she wouldn't get out of the nest and would just call the chicks from under her to scratch at the feed and water, and viciously protected them. On day 5, she began showing them around the shade tree and how to dust bathe. Every night, and for the hottest parts of the next day, I brought them all back into the house. Day 6 was a scorcher, so I waited extra late to put them outside. About 30 minutes into it, I noticed 2 whites were just not keeping up with momma as much. Everyone else was doing great, so I just took those 2 back into the house to cool down and to make sure they got plenty of water. They weren't trying to drink and just stood with their eyes closed, so I dipped their beaks. I noticed that their crops were hard as rocks. I treated for impacted crop and kept giving them water, and it looked like one was making a turn around. I didn't go to bed last night tending to the worse of the two. I got its crop to soften tremendously, but after I took a nap at 1 pm today, the one that had perked up and was running around peeping and drinking lay dead beside Janet. The worse one didn't look much better. I tended to him for the rest of the day and most of tonight. But what gets me, blows me away actually, is that during well chick's daily free ranging with Janet, a huge squirrel packed one of the Goldens away. I know how it sounds, crazy right? But I heard a commotion from Janet while I was inside tending to worse chick, ran outside, and saw her chasing a squirrel crying. The squirrel had "something" in its mouth and it wasn't a nut or feed. The other chicks were crying, and Janet abandoned the chase to return to the chicks. I searched and searched and couldn't find that chick. Now,at 12:59 am, I'm losing this other white chick. I have cried all day, and I've only cried over one other of my chickens. I'm just not a crier over my chickens...it's part of it. We even eat our roos, and I have no problems there. I guess I'm just exhausted and disappointed in myself for not knowing how to save them. I've had both my hips replaced and need my knees replaced and have severe scarring in my lungs @36 years old or I could have got to the gun faster to get that squirrel (and I never would have thought of a squirrel taking a chick...even after seeing it I spent an hour online to make sure I wasn't going crazy). I debated on doing the crop surgery to try and save this poor chick, but I'm so scared that it would lose too much blood, and it is so tiny that it has no spare to lose. So...I'm sitting here crying, feeling like a bad chicken momma, cuddling this dying chick, wondering how could I lose 3 in 24 hours.Like I said, I don't think it was Janet ' s fault, but I'm contemplating taking the remaining chicks from her and raising them in the house. I've never had luck like this with my chickens...I always figured it out. I've used broodies and incys and love both, but love how fast and healthy the chicks grow with a broody. Any advice? Or am I kicked out of the club?
hard lesson learned
