At loss for words!

[sevenfatcows]

Sad. Very sad. I would not get anymore until he understands how to handle animals. Going out and buying more is not teaching him anything. You need to sit down and talk with him. My six year old knows not to touch the chicks without asking mommy and having me around to monitor. He is good with them and knows they are not -toys- and to be gentle. I'm not sure why your kid would try and force the chick to drink water, or how long he held its face in the water to have it drown...

Sorry if I'm harsh but I wouldn't get anymore or have him handle them without you there. At all.

He would not need to hold it in the water for long at all. It is extremely easy to cause a chick to aspirate water-just dipping its beak past the nostrils will do the trick if it inhales. Anyone who has needed to use an eyedropper to give a liquid to a weak chick is familiar with this. I have myself accidentally dipped a squirming chick a bit too deep in weak chick solution. If he saw an adult dip the chicks' beaks when they were put into the brooder, he may have gotten the idea to "help" it drink. I am sure all the humans involved feel bad enough without holding an inquest. If you want to get another chick, it will be just fine added to the bunch, even just one, so long as they are still very young. People who are five years old tend to make bad decisions-if all the little ones now know to wait for a grown-up to help them visit with the chicks, I think I'd call it a day....

 

[Fields Mountain Farm]

As a 3 or 4 year old our son put a litter of kittens in the sink to 'wash' them. Yeah, they drowned, and guess what he did not turn out to be a sociopath. Kids do dumb stuff. To the OP you have handled things perfectly. For anyone to even infer that this might have been intentional is absolutely insensitive.

Well put Sourland! I couldn't have put it better!

 

[kwebb]

I did not mean to cause a debate. He loves animals so doing it on purpose with the intent to kill the chick is hard to believe no matter what some of you say. I think it would be different if he was a little older but he is immature and it happened.

 

[Fields Mountain Farm]

I did not mean to cause a debate. He loves animals so doing it on purpose with the intent to kill the chick is hard to believe no matter what some of you say. I think it would be different if he was a little older but he is immature and it happened.

 

[bobbi-j]

I did not mean to cause a debate. He loves animals so doing it on purpose with the intent to kill the chick is hard to believe no matter what some of you say. I think it would be different if he was a little older but he is immature and it happened.

Exactly. Did he see you dip their beaks when you first got them? Was he imitating that? Things happen, and we learn from them. Some lessons are just a little harder than others. Give him a hug, let him know you love him. It'll be OK.

 

[sevenfatcows]

Here is another angle: No one saw what the five year old child actually did. It is possible that the chick was already dead when he tried to help it. How many times have any of us who raise many chicks during the year looked in to the brooder first thing in the morning and found a dead chick trampled by its hatchmates? This would explain why he thought the other chicks had done it.

 

[kwebb]

Yes we showed him first thing to do when chicks get a drink but that was a week ago. He admitted to doing to it. I know him and don’t think he did it on purpose or intended to harm the chick.

 

[2 many chickens]

He would not need to hold it in the water for long at all. It is extremely easy to cause a chick to aspirate water-just dipping its beak past the nostrils will do the trick if it inhales. Anyone who has needed to use an eyedropper to give a liquid to a weak chick is familiar with this. I have myself accidentally dipped a squirming chick a bit too deep in weak chick solution. If he saw an adult dip the chicks' beaks when they were put into the brooder, he may have gotten the idea to "help" it drink. I am sure all the humans involved feel bad enough without holding an inquest. If you want to get another chick, it will be just fine added to the bunch, even just one, so long as they are still very young. People who are five years old tend to make bad decisions-if all the little ones now know to wait for a grown-up to help them visit with the chicks, I think I'd call it a day....

Whatever the case may be, she/he shouldn't allow the child to tend to the animals alone. Teach him to come to you and ask.

 

[Acre4Me]

Sorry about your chick. Kids... always something new and occasionally surprising.

One kid of mine killed a hamster accidentally by squeezing it too hard (which is apparently not hard to do). Child (age 5) only handled hamster with supervision, but it started acting ill within 24-48 hours of being at our house and was only handled a few times by child. When we were trying to figure out why hamster was sick,did child squeeze it, child admitted that hamster would squeak if squeezed and it sounded cute, so child squeezed (not very hard though because we would have noticed). Anyway, poor hamster passed on and we did not get another one. Child is older and takes care of animals quite well and remembers the hamster incident -says knows now why squeezing was bad, but because it sounded cute didn’t think (at age 5) was hurting the hamster- hamster seemed fine after being held, so cause/effect wasn’t comnected immediately.

 

[Ravynscroft]

As a 3 or 4 year old our son put a litter of kittens in the sink to 'wash' them. Yeah, they drowned, and guess what he did not turn out to be a sociopath. Kids do dumb stuff. To the OP you have handled things perfectly. For anyone to even infer that this might have been intentional is absolutely insensitive.

X2!