chick not growing.... help please!

[wjallen05]

I ordered 10 Exchequer Leghorn chicks from Ideal back in June. One of them wasn't right from the start, and it died after a couple of days. It never did move around much and I couldn't get it to eat or drink. I even had in inside on a heating pad, feeding it with a syringe but it still didn't make it. Another chick was very tiny and died at a couple of weeks. Now they are about 9 or 10 weeks old, and a few of them are about 1/3 or even 1/4 the size of the rest of them. One in particular is the same size as my 3 week old chicks. Why is it so small? I noticed a few weeks ago that some had very runny poops so I treated them with Sulmet, and now their poops are normal again but I am really wanting to know why some of them are not growing. I will get pictures today and add them later.
Thanks in advance.

 

[usschicago1]

Try A diffrent Food. Possibly there not getting the right nutrients. Hope I Helped.
Mark.
Goodluck-~

 

[wjallen05]

I give them starter/grower. No one else has any suggestions? I forgot to get pictures... need to do that

 

[Shiningfeather]

I am not sure what caused my tiny midg. but I had one that I had hatched from eggs from my girls....mutts. Anyway she never grew. she was four months old and was the size of a two week old and only had two feathers on each wing.....the rest was fuzz. DH and I talked about culling and I just didn't want to do it so I had plans for bringing her in over the winter months. She stayed with her hatch mates even when they went to the big girl pen and did great.
I recently had a predator attack and she passed on to the great coop in the sky along with 15 others. I miss going out every day and seeing what she is doing, she never knew she was so tiny. REST IN PEACE MY LITTLE TWO FEATHERS.

Oh and the pred issue has been resolved......two dogs that belonged to the neighbors will not kill any more birds!!!

 

[wjallen05]

oh no!! So sorry for your loss. That is very sad. I have lost many chickens and chicks. A couple of Pit Bulls came onto our property and killed my chickens who were free-ranging. A couple disappeared one day, my BELOVED rooster who I miss dearly was found dead the next, and the day after that we caught those dogs in the act. We don't have to worry about them any more. I am SO thankful that my children were not outside when those dogs were coming around. Anyway, and then my CATS broke into my Ameraucana pen and killed three of them... they were just dead. They were only about 3 months old maybe at the time. About a month later, 7 of my 10 RIR chicks went missing from the brooder, I moved them to a different cage and up high out of reach of predators, and a few days later the lid was knocked off and they were gone. I was completely devastated. We found chicken parts and feathers under the house where the cats go to the bathroom. We don't have those cats any more.

 

[HEChicken]

I'm not sure either what causes "failure to thrive". I also keep cornsnakes and I once had a snake that "failed to thrive". I fed it every week along with all the other snakes. The snake weighed 10 grams and could eat a mouse pinkie. Over the course of 3 months, with regular feedings, all the other snakes gained weight consistently and reached the point they were eating large fuzzies. This little snake still weighed 10 grams and couldn't eat anything bigger than a pinkie. Eventually it just...died. I never did know why under the same conditions it never got any bigger.

Now that I have chicks I have one that I thought would be a "failure to thrive". It turns out it is thriving but developing much slower than the others. It is half the size and not nearly as feathered out as the other chicks from the same hatch. Nevertheless it IS growing so I've stopped worrying. To reassure myself, I asked my teen daughter to weigh the chicks every Sunday. After a couple of weeks it was clear to see that it IS growing - just not at the rate of the others.

If you haven't already, you can try putting ACV in the water and a little natural yogurt in a mash. Don't know if it will help but it certainly won't hurt.

 

[Shiningfeather]

Quote:
Sorry for your loses also. It sound as if you have had many. I have been lucky and only had the one but for me it was a big one. We really put our hearts into the birds, don't we.

Have you contacted Ideal to see what they have to say? Maybe others have had the same problem and they will send you more.

Does not hurt to try.

 

[HBuehler]

I have a little pullet compared to rest of her hatch we call her "pint" pint sized but she's healthy and doing fine.As long as she's doing fine you don't need to worry there is nothing wrong with being different

 

[ChikeeMomma]

I have four EE pullets and one of them was quite a bit smaller than the others. I'd say probably the same as yours -- 1/3 to 1/4 the size of the other three. Well, probably when she was around 17 weeks or so she had a growth spurt and now is the same size as the others. You would never know she used to be so tiny.