Chick very lethargic

[Twilliams87]

I have 7 chicks I just hatched out of an incubator that are 3 days old. 6 of them are doing great but the last 1 to hatch is only 1/2 the size of the others and doesn't want to eat or drink water. It had some hard poop stuck to its little butt so I soaked that off and it pooped a little while I was running warm water over it but when I gave it some water it acted like it was choking. HELP!!

 

[EggSighted4Life]

Hi there, welcome to BYC!

Sounds like failure to thrive. These chicks just don't seem to connect with food or water even when everyone around them is and we can't SEE anything wrong with them. Tjey may have internal digestive or other problems. Since they run out of yolk around 3 days and are essentially starving to death slowly, I cull them. Also if they aspirate (breath in) water when trying to drink the water gets in the lungs and make crackling sound, usually don't recover.

Some folks will go through the trouble of tube feeding to try and save it. There are threads on here if you wanna go that route.

Otherwise, keep the bumm clean. Maybe try running your finger through the feed and use a fast paced high pitched voice say "look babe, look". You can try adding water to the feed and making a mash. Poultry Nutri drench, can work wonders... though mine who were like this would fail as soon as I quit adding PND to the water.

Congrats on your other babies!