Baby chicks all dead

[tigerlilycnm]

They are all gone. My husband is going to bury them today. Going to try one more time and start incubating on a Saturday so I can be at home for the first couple days.

 

[azygous]

I woke up thinking about your precious little ones. So tragic.

Please consider a heating pad system to brood the next chicks. It's fool-proof as far as providing the right sort of heat without any of the dangers of a heat lamp. Most of us who began using the MHP system several years ago would never go back to heat lamps.

 

[Redhead Rae]

I use an electric brooder plate, which serves the same purpose as a MHP system, but it is purpose built. I've personally been burned by a heating pad and would be afraid to put it in wood chips. It takes a little while to train the chicks to use it, but the younger they are the better they take to it. With my last batch, I had them in a bathtub. I would check on them every few hours, if they were huddled in a corner, I shove them under the brooder plate. It took them a day or two to figure out the brooder was better than piling in a corner. When I moved them into my outdoor brooding coop when they were 1.5-2 weeks, they took to piling in the corner again. There were several stubborn chicks that wouldn't go under and it was supposed to go down to the mid 30's that night so I had to wait until after full dark and the chicks had huddled into a corner and gone to sleep. I checked later and they were all still under the plate. I didn't have to do it again because they relearned the plate in their new environment.

 

[azygous]

I need to respectfully add some information to raecarrow's post for clarification purposes.

The flash point of wood shavings, the temperature at which accumulated heat will cause the material to burst into flame, is around 250F, depending on the kind of wood. While a heating pad can get hot enough to burn skin, skin burning with prolonged contact with temps as low as 109F and severe burns at 176F, since the manufacturers of heating pads state that their pads can get up to 110F to 118F, these are not hot enough temps to ignite wood shavings, though they can burn skin.

The heating pad comes with a cloth cover that will diffuse the hottest temps, making it far less likely to burn skin. The MHP setup is recommended to include, not just the cloth cover over the plastic pad, but a pillow case enclosing the pad and the rack that supports it above the chicks. These covers insure the chicks will not be burned and makes it impossible for shavings to come anywhere close to being hot enough to catch fire.

As far as any electrical appliance failing and causing sparks that can ignite flammable material, that would also apply to reptile heat pads and electric brooder plates. You need to inspect cords for signs of cracking and fraying, and replace old heating pads as they reach that "brittle" stage.

 

[lazy gardener]

So I just successfully hatched 9 of 9 eggs, the last one hatching this morning. I made sure they had food and water, and then I went to work. Heating lamp is about a foot to a foot and a half above the chicks. I got home from work today to my kids calling me saying all the chicks were dead. I checked them, and they are all completely non-responsive, but their bodies aren't cold. Also if I put my fingers pressed softly up against each chick's chest, I can feel, just barely, movement in their chest like very light breathing. I realize that if they are this close to death, they are too late to save, or maybe its just my imagination and they are all dead. What could have killed them? Even if they ran out of water they just hatched within the last 2 days, and I know the yolk is suppose to keep them supplemented for up to 3 days. And could they really die of dehydration in just 8 hours, if the water could have even dried up that fast?

Please keep dipping thief beaks in water. If you have any vitamin or electrolyte you can mix in to the water do that too. Try to watch each one after you dip thier beaks in and see if they are tying to get the water down, that would be a really good sign

Never, never, never try to get liquid into an unconscious person or animal.

Running out of water, even for a couple of hours will easily kill a chick. And overheating will kill them even faster. If your heat lamp was the typical one sold by TSC, it's 250W. IMO, these stores and the companies that manufacture and market these bulbs for use in chick brooders need to specifically state the risk of fire, the fact that these bulbs are INAPPROPRIATE TO USE IN THE AVERAGE HOME.

What were the dimensions of your brooder? Was it by any chance a plastic tote? These totes can easily overheat and cause death. That's why I call a tote/heat lamp brooder set up "the Easy Bake oven".

Waterers can easily go dry if shavings get kicked into them, or if the base is even just a tiny bit cross threaded or a bit of sediment/shavings/grit gets stuck between the mouth of the jar and the seal at the bottom of the base.

 

[chickens really]

For smaller brooders I use 175 watt bulbs...I also use my finger to train Chicks as Momma would where feed and water is...Only the place they sleep needs to be warm....Other areas can be cool...I keep the feed and water at the cool end of Brooder....I place feed and water up on Bricks....Best wishes..

 

[Sara Ranch]

*hugs*

 

[Ridgerunner]

Correct me if I’m wrong, but the chicks had been hatched two days in your incubator. Since they absorb the yolk they can go three days or more without dehydrating or starving. Running out of water was not your issue. I don’t know what kind of waterer you use or how much water was in it but nine chicks is not a lot, at that age they are not going to drink a lot. I assume they had water when you left? For your waterer to be dry is kind of mysterious, was here a leak you need to fix for next time?

You’ve used that set-up before and it worked fine. I don’t know what your brooder looks like, how big it is, anything like that. To me the best way to set up a brooder whether you use heat lamps, hovers, heating pads, heat plates, or any other method is to provide a warm spot with other areas that are cooler. I find mine to be excellent at self-regulating temperature straight out of the incubator if given a chance. Could you tell us a bit more about that brooder and how it is set up to help us know what you are dealing with instead of just guessing. How well is it ventilated, especially up high? Ventilation can be very important. Photos would be great. It is possible that they did overheat but why this time and not the previous brood?

To me it sounds more like poisoning of some sort with all nine chicks affected. What is different from last time when it worked? Are you using cedar shavings instead of pine? Is it in a different location? I don’t know how you heat your house but are fumes from a heater present when they were not before? Did the water or feed get contaminated? A few years back in a similar situation the person found that the kids had fed the chicks something poisonous while she was gone. Did you use a cleaning agent that did not get totally rinsed out when cleaning the brooder? Since it worked before something is different this time. What is it?

 

[chickens really]

I agree with Ridgerunner....Although if heat was too warm they quickly dehydrate....Also cedar is toxic to birds....
Post pictures of brooder if possible in the same setting it was when all passed....

 

[Ridgerunner]

A thought in whether it was too hot. Where were the bodies? Were they as far from the heat source as they could get or were they randomly scattered? If a chick or even adult chicken is overheating they will get as far from the heat source as they can get.