Baby chick with hurt leg

[Agentlx75]

Have you been seeing that she's eating and drinking? Pain causes baby chicks not to want to do these simple survival actions.

Warm sugar water immediately and use the cortisone to reduce the pain. Then try to get the chick to eat finely minced boiled egg after it revives.

She has been eating and drinking. I've been giving B100 and she had started to walk some but now this.... She won't even open the one eye. I fear I may have done the dropper wrong. I was putting it in the right side of her mouth but now this

 

[azygous]

Is the breathing? Is it making rattling sounds when it tries to breathe?

 

[Agentlx75]

Is the breathing? Is it making rattling sounds when it tries to breathe?

There's what I would call a popping sound when she breaths

 

[azygous]

If she made a choking sound when you gave her water, then some may have been aspirated. But more likely, she has other issues than what you are able to see.

When a chick, or chicken, drops off into unconsciousness like that, often death is imminent. I'm sorry. But I doubt it's related to the sore foot.

 

[Agentlx75]

If she made a choking sound when you gave her water, then some may have been aspirated. But more likely, she has other issues than what you are able to see.

When a chick, or chicken, drops off into unconsciousness like that, often death is imminent. I'm sorry. But I doubt it's related to the sore foot if it's something u see able and nothing I've done then I feel better but I feel like I drowned her. She never made odd sounds but she was never fond of me administering the medication either. She is still alive but very lethargic and no long we wants to eat or drink

 

[Agentlx75]

Thank you everyone for all your help but unfortunately she did not make it. I'm pretty certain she aspirated the vitamin B100 mix and just didn't make it

 

[azygous]

I'm sorry. I should have given you better instruction.

The esophagus is an open channel on the chicken's right side of their throat. With baby chicks, you either use a slender syringe or eye dropper and slide it to the back of the right side of the throat, or just give a drop at a time in the right side of the beak. If you squirt it into the mouth without keeping to the side of the mouth, the fluid can go into that center hole you can see behind the tongue, and that is the airway leading to the lungs. Often, a little fluid may make a chicken cough, and then you know you're squirting it too far toward the center and you then need to reposition the syringe so it's along the side of the throat as shown here.

But I still have doubts you caused the chick to aspirate. Usually it kills the chicken instantly.

Please try not to feel that you did something to cause this death. And even if you did, we all can't know everything about chickens all the time and do exactly the correct thing. I've lost more than my share of chickens because I didn't know what I was doing. About the only people who have never lost a chicken to a human mistake are those that have just returned home with their very first chicks.

 

[Agentlx75]

I'm sorry. I should have given you better instruction. View attachment 2657745The esophagus is an open channel on the chicken's right side of their throat. With baby chicks, you either use a slender syringe or eye dropper and slide it to the back of the right side of the throat, or just give a drop at a time in the right side of the beak. If you squirt it into the mouth without keeping to the side of the mouth, the fluid can go into that center hole you can see behind the tongue, and that is the airway leading to the lungs. Often, a little fluid may make a chicken cough, and then you know you're squirting it too far toward the center and you then need to reposition the syringe so it's along the side of the throat as shown here.

But I still have doubts you caused the chick to aspirate. Usually it kills the chicken instantly.

Please try not to feel that you did something to cause this death. And even if you did, we all can't know everything about chickens all the time and do exactly the correct thing. I've lost more than my share of chickens because I didn't know what I was doing. About the only people who have never lost a chicken to a human mistake are those that have just returned home with their very first chicks.

Thank you. I did not have my dropper that far back I tried but then she would start yanking her head around so I thought I was too far. At any rate it is what it is. I've learnt from this and if it happens again in the future I will know what to do and what not to do. It is a lesson for my son, my husband and myself. Death definitely was not instant, she had started walking around 9 this morning when I checked on her and then I have some more b100 and she started acting oddly (would swallow a little then would hold it then swallow a little more and did this several times, quit chirping at me as she always did when I was around, are much less than usual and was laying on her side with feet behind her) so I let her rest and went back out around 12-1ish (or when ever it was that I posted asking if she was trying to die on me) and she was not making any noise at all, tried to give her more but she wouldn't swallow, I felt her crop to see if she had been eating and when I did liquid bubbled out of her mouth so I cleaned her up with a paper towel and offered food to which there was no interest at all not any interest in regular water, tried giving sugar water and she would not swallow it so I went to run some errands and after getting home I check again and she was almost lifeless, couldn't get her to open her eyes at all, she was very limp, breathing was very shallow, told my husband what condition she was in and about 20 minutes later when I was almost done with supper he went to check on her and she was gone. Overall time from when she 1st started acting odd till death was about at least 5 hours....

Sorry for such a long reply lol

 

[azygous]

It sounds like she had other issues in addition to her foot. Genetic problems are sometimes slow to manifest, and though it may seem like a chick suddenly took a turn for the worse, it was likely happening from before the chick hatched.

It's always heartbreaking to lose a chick. I've lost my share, some were just dreadful experiences, but as you pointed out, we learn something from each one.