I also might add that if your temps are that warm and the birds are panting dropping wings to cool themselves, then I like to add a block of ice to the waterer to help cool that water right down and keep it down. I usually put a reused frozen plastic water bottle right into a gallon waterer...it keeps the water cooler for a longer period of time. The foamy poo might be just a stress poo. If it is more yellow mucousy and the fluff feathers are wet. She is dozing off often and not alert as a broody would be then there may be another condition at play.Question for all the experts
I'm worried about my 2nd broody. Went out after work and she was laying outside of the nest kinda sprawled out. I got her out and took her to the waterer (she has one in the kennel too) and she wouldnt drink. But she did poop this yellow, foamy poop(note, I looked at the poo chart and it looked like a cecal poo). She kinda walked around for a bit, scratched then plopped down on the floor of the coop. I'm not sure what to do, she has me worried. Her butt is all poopy too but I checked and the vent looks good, so I dont know what I can do for her. I did clean most of the poo off with a damp paper towel and got her to drink a bit more. She laid down on the coop floor again so I put her in the door of the kennel then she got right on the nest and hunkered down. She is panting too. She was fine this morning. What can I do to help her out?
There are no words to do this photo justice. But I'll try: adorable, precious miracles.I only had two eggs hatch and one chick died shortly after birth. (Shipped eggs) My broody did a great job though. I decided to give her 5 more baby chicks. She wasn't too sure about them at first, but now is contently sleeping on all of them. Here's my favorite pic of the afternoon:
Update on the Buckeye hatching...(from those expensive shipped eggs).
Whew...what a day....I've had smoother hatches than this, especially with my faithful Silkie.
After a very quick peek, 2 babies were freshly hatched this morning, and 1 egg had a large pip hole. I came home after 6 hours of being gone to find 2 chicks fluffed and thriving, 1 zipping, and 1 chick outside the nest box chilled and gasping its final breath, AND tiny black ants crawling all over it! (Those darn ants....will have to really treat the box when I can get the hatching process over and can move mom and chicks!)
I couldn't tell if mom had rejected it because it was a "failure to thrive" or if it had been accidentally pushed out/fallen out of the nest box insert (think wooden box with 1 1/2 inch lip setting inside the big nesting box) and mom couldn't coax it back in/get it back in since she was caring for the zipping one...mental note...I am going to do away with this small box insert as it may be creating a "stranded" issue with the newly hatched wobbly chicks...one hatch back (Marans) I also found a cold dead chick on the outside of the box. I thought it had died from omphalitis (which it clearly had a bad case of) and had been rejected and put there by mom, which it may have been as it's empty shell was beside it, but now.....hmmmmm.
Did a quick nest clean up again ridding some fortunately well formed poo from mom, tossing out ants with it...Mom was really, really mad as she desperately wanted to sit on the chick that is currently zipping.
I then brought the chilled runt gasping to the house. Overall it looked okay. Maybe a slight case of unclosed naval??? With possibly a little bluing/swelling at the naval. And crawling with ants! I decided to treat it as if it had a mild case since I had read chilling at hatch can bring that on. (Thoughts back to last hatch with this case...did the chick get rejected because of omphalitis, or get stranded outside this nest box insert and THEN get omphalitis...hmmmm...getting rid of the insert for sure...I had put it in as I had trouble with eggs rolling and clunking....apparently this insert is not the solution.)
Back to the gasping chick...After washing it in warm water (held under a gentle faucet) to clean off the ants and warm it up quickly, it revived in my hand...I fed it some Chick Saver with Sulmet in water solution (for any infection) from an eye dropper to boost it. Next I washed the naval with Clorhexiderm and applied bacitracin. I then dried the shivering chick with a hair dryer on warm/slow setting and placed it in our mini incubator...which had now warmed up...After about 30 minutes it was looking much brighter, and after 2 hours, little runt was chirping madly to be let out of the tiny incubator. It overall looked good, and the naval area had dried and closed tight, so I replaced it with mom...who was furious at being disturbed again as she was still tending the zipping one...I watched as the now 3 boisterous chicks vied around her to find a place, with the runt still weaker than the others...not sure how the Silkie is handling this round...extending her brood to 5 weeks waiting for shipped eggs may have been a bit much or trying to sit on 3 full size chicks with 1 zipping and 2 unhatched is simply too much....to date as I think back, she has always hatched 3 full sized that survived...but she hunkered down on the zipping chick and clucked at all hatched to move under her.
I placed the Chick Saver/Sulmet water solution in with the chicks in case there is some bacterial infection lurking. I did decide Mom had her wings full with 3 running around and 1 zipping, so I pulled the final 2 eggs that had no signs of pipping or zipping...candling them I discovered 1 egg was visible slosh and toss but the other definitely had a dark object, clear air sack, and possible life, so I placed it in the mini incubator to give it a chance to hatch as it might have been one of the incubator started eggs that developed a little more slowly. Time will tell.
I just checked again after leaving mom and babies for about a half hour to see if the "reject" runt chick has integrated back into the brood or was hovering outside the nest insert again. Fortunately all babies are under Mom. Will check again later tonight to make sure nobody's fallen out. Hopefully I will have 4 live and thriving chicks in the morning.
Will update then.
Photo below of little revived runt. Hopefully it's made it past the worst.
Always something to learn with each hatch!
Lady of McCamley
Chilled chicks are usually my worst worry also.... it is so difficult to balance the ability to keep the bedding within the nest box and keeping the lip low enough for chicks to easily navigate it.
Were they all adopted by her or did she hatch some as well? I am jealous, hopefully my broody can hatch some from the 17 eggs I put under her.
Squeaks and her brood
There's movement in the egg in the mini-incubator! I may get 5 Buckeyes yet!
Lady of McCamley
