7 Week Old Speckled Sussex With Small Spot Of Blood In Nostril

[BuddingGardener]

Hi, everyone!

I moved my four 7 week old chicks outside on Sunday evening, and they've been loving the outdoor life -- especially my speckled sussex who is a very avid forager. This evening she was sneezing just a little bit and had a tiny spot of blood in one nostril, but otherwise acting lively and normal with normal droppings. I figure that she probably just nicked her nose during foraging with some straw or something else on the floor of her run. Is this common? There would be other signs if there's something wrong, I assume? It's a VERY tiny bit of blood (enough that I had to look very closely to see) and they're a bit tough to wrangle out of the run. I don't want to stress her if I don't need to while she's still settling and learning her new home.

 

[azygous]

Sorry no one noticed your thread until now.

The chick likely suffered a little pecking injury from another chick, and sneezed as the blood tickled the tissue inside the nares.

That's pretty minor. However, not being able to handle your chicks is going to cause problems for you as chickens always need to be handled for health checkups and other things. Like love. You're missing out on a lot of chicken affection.

To condition your chicks to come to you willingly and to be perfectly fine being picked up and handled, use treats and a verbal or other auditory cue as you offer the treats. Continue this training over several days until the chicks are jumping into your lap to grab the treats. This training, occasionally reinforced, will last a lifetime and make handling your chicken very easy and fun.

 

[BuddingGardener]

Oh @azygous I spend time with them and hand-feed treats every day, and sometimes I'm sitting with them for hours! I can round them up if I have to but I don't want to stress them out if I don't have to. My two easter eggers are the most skittish, but all four chickens are okay with some petting and eating treats from my hands. I'm gentling them on their terms to hop up to me.

As far as the small injury, it was gone overnight and she's fine. These little chickens get a lot of love, please don't worry about that.