10 day old Jersey Giant chick injured by other chicks. It's not an emergency - need advice on next steps

[ChicksbyGrace]

My Jersey Giant Chicks are 10 days old (The flock is 15 straight run chicks from a hatchery). This afternoon, I heard screeching from the brooder. Dashing to the brooder I find several chicks pecking at one chick's vent. I scoop up the chick and find it is bleeding from the outside of the vent. After stopping the bleeding with a paper towel, I treated the injury with hydrogen peroxide, rinsed with saline solution then, antibiotic cream. Poor little thing snuggled in my arm for 1/2 an hour to warm up before looking around. After eating a little hard boiled egg yolk and drinking water the chick is asleep on a soft towel under a microfiber cloth in a small box.

I had Barred Rock and Brown Leghorn chicks last year and did not have an injury. I dwelt with this injury as I have with sick or injured pullets and cockerels in this past year. I think this little one will be okay. Now, here is my dilemma:
What do I do now?

Any suggestions for caring for such a young injured chick?

I also can't put the chick back with the flock while it's healing and my small dog kennel is too big for the brooder. I also don't want the chick to get chilled (A/C at 79). The chicks have been happiest under the heat lamp at 85 - 95 degrees. I also don't think this one will stay in the box when waking from sleep.
Any suggestions? I'm off to see if I have a clear plastic box that might work...
Thank you for your help!

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

How big is their brooder? That type of aggression at that age is generally because they need more room, or are too warm. You can use a small piece of fencing to form a circle to isolate the chick within the group.

 

[ChicksbyGrace]

How big is their brooder? That type of aggression at that age is generally because they need more room, or are too warm. You can use a small piece of fencing to form a circle to isolate the chick within the group.

Good Morning,
Thank you for the great info. After chicken & garden chores, I ran the numbers and the brooder is a bit small. it is 31"x 21" which for 15 chicks is about 0.3 SF per chick. I also didn't factor in the growth rate of a Jersey. They have doubled in size in the 7 days I have had them.

I shifted the brooder so there is a larger area with less heat. Watching them last night & this morning, I find at night they like the 90-95 degree range. This morning they are primarily in the 80 - 85 degree area. Enlarging the cooler area has settled them down too.

Next we will expand the brooder today to give them about 0.5 SF per bird), and fashion an area for the injured bird with a piece of chicken wire.
The brooder is made out of moving boxes so expanding is easy. With as fast as they are growing, we will probably expand again the next week. Lesson Learned!

I'll keep this updated (successes and failures ) I've got to go unpack another large box! Thank you again!

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

The usual advice to start the brooder at around 90 degrees and drop it by 5 degrees a week. So by 2 weeks I'd shoot for 80 degrees at the warm end. I always use their behaviors to help me decide if it's right. They will be spread out evenly if the temperature is correct for their age. Some under the light, some out of the light, and they are quietly peeping, and there's no poopy butts.

They do grow fast. I find after 10-14 day they like to be more busy, and active and it can help to start adding enrichment like perches, dishes of sand, or clods of sod to give them something to start pecking and scratching at. They also will start testing their wings and sparring soon, so room to run and flap is always good.

If it gets warm enough outside I start short visits to a grassy area. Their minds start to get busier and busier. One year when I wasn't feeling well I failed to enlarge their brooder soon enough and saw some pecking. It stopped as soon as I gave them more room.

If you think about the way a broody hens does it she stays close or on the nest for around a week or two before beginning to move off. She returns at night until chicks are ready to roost. So young chicks are content with less space, but they quickly want more.

It also takes chicks around two weeks to begin to be able to regulate their own body temperature. Once that happen and they have enough feathers a warm brooder can be uncomfortable. They always enjoy the warmth again at night, so I usually provide that for a few more weeks.

Hopefully they they do well.

 

[Ridgerunner]

A few years back I had a two week old chick kill a hatch mate and start in on another, pecking at the head. They were with a broody hen who had over 2,000 square feet to roam in. I don't think they were crowded. But I do agree that overcrowding can cause them to peck each other. You want to give them plenty of room. Having enough room is very important. But you can never know what a chick will do. Each is an individual.

Instead of worrying about trying to keep their entire universe one perfect temperature I try to keep one area warm enough and let the rest cool off as it will. I brood out of doors and with temperature swings I could not do that if I wanted to. When mine go straight out of the incubator after hatch into my 3' x 6' brooder they can regulate where they need to be. Some mornings the far corner may have frost in it but one corner is toasty warm. They do fine.

To return that chick to the brooder I'd make a box out of a fine mesh material or maybe use one of those mesh boxes fruit or berries often come in. The chick will need its own food and water under there but that can stop the other chicks from pecking it and killing it. Having it in the brooder will help integration later. An alternative would be to keep it isolated until the wound was no longer fresh. Some chicks peck at bright red, like blood. You don't want it a bright red color.

When my chicks hatch under a broody they tend to spend the first 2 to 4 days under her staying warm, coming out to eat and drink. But then they spend a fair amount of time running around out from under the broody. My incubator chicks follow a similar pattern in the brooder. At first the spend most of the time in the warmer area but pretty soon they are running all over.

 

[NatJ]

The usual advice to start the brooder at around 90 degrees and drop it by 5 degrees a week.

That is the usual advice, but I prefer a simpler method (similar to what @Ridgerunner does).

Make one corner be 90 degrees or warmer.
Make the brooder big enough that they have plenty of cool space.
If needed, add even more cool space.
Leave the warm area alone, always the same temperature, until the chicks are not using it-- then remove it. At any time, feel free to add even MORE cool space.

A broody hen does not drop her temperature every week as the chicks grow older. They just spend less time underneath her, and more time doing things outside. Eventually the chicks cannot all fit underneath her, although she may kick them out before they get that big.

Brooder plates and heating pad caves use a similar system, and it works just as well with a heat lamp as it does with any other heat source. You just have to make sure there is plenty of cool space.

I always use their behaviors to help me decide if it's right. They will be spread out evenly if the temperature is correct for their age. Some under the light, some out of the light, and they are quietly peeping, and there's no poopy butts.

I agree about watching their behavior. But as long as the brooder is big enough, it doesn't bother me to find all the chicks out of the light during the day, if they still want to sleep under it at night.

Next we will expand the brooder today to give them about 0.5 SF per bird), and fashion an area for the injured bird with a piece of chicken wire.
The brooder is made out of moving boxes so expanding is easy. With as fast as they are growing, we will probably expand again the next week. Lesson Learned!

At this age, you can expand it as fast as you like. If you have enough space and enough boxes, you could go up to 1 or 2 or more square feet per chick. More space does make it easier to provide a separate place for the injured one.

In the first few days there is a chance of chicks wandering into a cold corner and getting lost, but by the time they are past a week old, there is no real danger of that with normal healthy chicks.

 

[ChicksbyGrace]

Thank you all for the wonderful advice. I have been putting it into practice. The chicks are so much happier now in the bigger brooder with a long roost. The injured chick is still separated but doing well. The redness has faded to yellow skin with a patch of reddish pink on the vent.

The other chicks visit Buddy (my nickname for him or her) through the wire fence. Buddy loves eating and drinking with no crowding. LOL. Buddy also beds down near the fence on the end of the perch that sticks into the enclosure. So Cute! If the redness goes away, I hope to integrate buddy to the flock tomorrow or Tuesday.

I didn't realize I could start expanding the brooder and introducing them to more entertainment this early. That makes things easier. The chicks I raised last year were so different. I guess the old adage is true. With your 1st child you write the manual and with your 2nd child you throw away the manual and start over!

This week I plan to further expand the brooder and get them some entertainment to occupy these busy chicks! I plan on bringing the grass with dirt and some sand in for them. Then possibly taking them outside. I have a small dog kennel that I can probably use to protect them from the hawks outside. I may cover it in chicken wire so the chicks don't get out...
We have lots of fun stuff to do this week with these little hens & roosters!
I truly appreciate the advice and information.

 

[ChicksbyGrace]

Update: It's been a long 2 weeks. But I was able to integrate the 3 chicks back with the other chicks last night. We had battle with pasty butt due to all the pecking and stress on these little ones.
The stress got me thinking. The other 12 chicks from the hatchery are okay, except more active and aggressive than these chicks.
I have another chick, not one of the chicks in this thread, that started acting strange yesterday. (I'll ask about that one in a new thread.)
I got 2 batches of chicks from a different hatchery last year and had no problems with sickness or injuries in the brooder, even when the brooder needed to be expanded.
I think the difference may be I ordered these chicks from Iowa and they were 3 days old when I received them (I picked them up within 10 min of the Post Office call at 8 am). These chicks arrived very hungry, thirsty and seemed stressed.
Last year both chick orders were from Missouri and the chicks were 2 days old when they arrived. They ate and drank but didn't seem stressed.
I'm thinking if I order again it will be better to order closer to home. Unfortunately I haven't found a good hatchery with reasonable prices here in Florida. It seems the hatcheries here specialize in specialty breeds and/or selling started fowl. They seem much smaller than the online hatcheries (sigh).
From your experience is this possible? Is it better to shorten the transport time? I think this is a lesson learned moment...

 

[NatJ]

Update: It's been a long 2 weeks. But I was able to integrate the 3 chicks back with the other chicks last night. We had battle with pasty butt due to all the pecking and stress on these little ones.
The stress got me thinking. The other 12 chicks from the hatchery are okay, except more active and aggressive than these chicks.
I have another chick, not one of the chicks in this thread, that started acting strange yesterday. (I'll ask about that one in a new thread.)
I got 2 batches of chicks from a different hatchery last year and had no problems with sickness or injuries in the brooder, even when the brooder needed to be expanded.
I think the difference may be I ordered these chicks from Iowa and they were 3 days old when I received them (I picked them up within 10 min of the Post Office call at 8 am). These chicks arrived very hungry, thirsty and seemed stressed.
Last year both chick orders were from Missouri and the chicks were 2 days old when they arrived. They ate and drank but didn't seem stressed.
I'm thinking if I order again it will be better to order closer to home. Unfortunately I haven't found a good hatchery with reasonable prices here in Florida. It seems the hatcheries here specialize in specialty breeds and/or selling started fowl. They seem much smaller than the online hatcheries (sigh).
From your experience is this possible? Is it better to shorten the transport time? I think this is a lesson learned moment...

The time in shipping could be part of the difference.

The weather might make a difference too. Being shipped in hot weather, or cold weather, or moderat weather, can make a difference in how much the chicks are stressed.

Different breeds, and different individual chicks, could also have more or less trouble with the same shipping conditions.

As regards longer vs. shorter transport time, maybe try different hatcheries. One year I ordered from 3 different hatcheries, and one set of chicks arrived a day faster than the other two sets. No, that hatchery was not noticeably closer than the other two hatcheries. I'm guessing that one had more direct airplane flights, so they skipped one round of being transferred and sitting around, but I have no way to tell for sure.

If you can't find suitable hatcheries close to you, I would try a different hatchery next time, and see how it goes. There may be one that can get chicks to you faster than another one, or it might just be coincidence about weather or individual breeds or something like that.

 

[ChicksbyGrace]

Thank you. That makes sense. I didn't consider the weather changes. The weather been crazy here but our lows have been in the 40s to 60s with highs in the low 70s to mid 80s. I have them inside with a heat lamp. I started at 95 and now they are at 80 degrees and seem to be handling the weekly step downs well. The shift from Iowa to Florida on a plan could have been massive.
I'm just going to keep caring for these little ones as best as I can! Hopefully they will make it through and become strong Jersey Giants