Hello friends! I have some chicks that are 2 and 3 weeks old. This inquiry is in reference to a 3 week old probable Mille Fleur D’Uccle Bantam. This chick has been named Charlotte (doing everything I can to will it to be a pullet). Charlotte was purchased from TSC at around 1 week old along with 4 other Bantams and then 1 week later, I added 5 more two day old bantams. With an entire Bantam flock being a new thing to me, I constantly worried that my brooder heating plate wasn't enough heat for them, so I had a heat lamp on the opposite side of the brooder (the heat lamp was removed completely once all chicks were at least 1 week old and everyone was moving around the entire brooder throughout the day happily). I'm sure the stress from being shipped, living in a TSC chick bin for almost a week, moving to their home/change of environment, and the dry air caused by the heat lamp, caused pasty butt in Charlotte. I cleared her vent everyday, sometimes twice a day, so she was never really blocked. I did trim her feathers in hopes of keeping poop from sticking. Sometimes I used warm water to remove the poop and sometimes, after reading about a long time member on here used petroleum jelly to remove poop/pasty butt, I would use that. Now that the heat lamp isn't being used, I am still checking Charlotte's butt, but she's not had to be cleaned in the past 2 days. The problem is that the feathers are gone from all around her vent and her skin is flaky, and the very top layer of skin seems to be peeling off. There is no raw areas or any redness, but I'm still concerned that there could be a problem and I don't want to miss anything that needs attention. Charlotte eats and drinks and happily plays around like the others. She's learned how to jump on top of the heating plate, like the bigger chicks (she's a tiny little compact bird), recently. I don't see any bullying or pecking from any of the chicks, although they do clean each other's beaks often but are always very gentle with each other. Is there anything I can do or is this normal for a chick that suffered with pasty butt for almost a week (although it was cleaned often)? Thank you for your time and any advice you can offer. Stay well!
