Chicks dying…help!

[chitlen]

is there any thing physically wrong with the chick

 

[NatJ]

The hatches earlier in the year were when it was warm and since it’s now cold I’ve put this hatch and the last on in the house.

I know lots of people do brood chicks inside their houses safely, so this might not be the cause of your problems, but since it a change I would look around the house to see if there is any likely cause.

Nonstick pans (teflon) can give off fumes toxic to birds, especially if they get too hot, so you might look at how close the chicks are to the kitchen and what kind of cookware/cooking style has been used while the chicks are in the house.

What you described of the chicks' behavior, and the number of them that died during the night (when I assume no-one was cooking anything) make me think it's probably not a cooking-related issue, but I'm mentioning it just in case.

Air fresheners and cleaning chemicals also get listed as possible causes of chick death, so consider what gets used in that part of your house (laundry soap, dish soap, window cleaner, floor cleaner, bathroom cleaners, carpet shampoo, etc.)

Since this has now happened twice, it is more likely to be something used regularly (air freshener) and less likely to be something that happens rarely (carpet cleaning). But of course it might be something completely different, like one of the points other people have brought up.

 

[Chickandducklover]

I would definitely run some bleach water in it everywhere it is safe to after cleaning it this round. Pathogens can build up.

How was your hatch? How many eggs did you set, how many did not develop, how many developed and quit in the shell, how many successfully hatched, etc? Were the chicks vigorous when you took them out of the incubator?

We started with 13 duck eggs and 11 chicken eggs. They were put in a week apart due to hatching time difference. 4 duck eggs stopped developing after 1 week and 3 more after 2 weeks. So far 5 have hatched and 2 are still on n the incubator. They were a day early so these last 2 still have time to hatch. As for the chickens only 1 never developed and 1 is in the incubator left to hatch. All were vigorous when they went into the brooder.

 

[Chickandducklover]

is there any thing physically wrong with the chick

Not that I can tell.

 

[Chickandducklover]

I know lots of people do brood chicks inside their houses safely, so this might not be the cause of your problems, but since it a change I would look around the house to see if there is any likely cause.

Nonstick pans (teflon) can give off fumes toxic to birds, especially if they get too hot, so you might look at how close the chicks are to the kitchen and what kind of cookware/cooking style has been used while the chicks are in the house.

What you described of the chicks' behavior, and the number of them that died during the night (when I assume no-one was cooking anything) make me think it's probably not a cooking-related issue, but I'm mentioning it just in case.

Air fresheners and cleaning chemicals also get listed as possible causes of chick death, so consider what gets used in that part of your house (laundry soap, dish soap, window cleaner, floor cleaner, bathroom cleaners, carpet shampoo, etc.)

Since this has now happened twice, it is more likely to be something used regularly (air freshener) and less likely to be something that happens rarely (carpet cleaning). But of course it might be something completely different, like one of the points other people have brought up.

Thanks. I’ll keep racking my brain to see if I can figure it out.

 

[Mosey2003]

We started with 13 duck eggs and 11 chicken eggs. They were put in a week apart due to hatching time difference. 4 duck eggs stopped developing after 1 week and 3 more after 2 weeks. So far 5 have hatched and 2 are still on n the incubator. They were a day early so these last 2 still have time to hatch. As for the chickens only 1 never developed and 1 is in the incubator left to hatch. All were vigorous when they went into the brooder.

In your successful batches, prior to these latest 2, were you running duck eggs with them or chicken only?

I would very strongly suggest sanitizing the incubator(s), duck eggs are much dirtier than chicken eggs. I'm thinking that could very well be a problem.

 

[Kellyjenny]

Use paper towels or you can use doggie pee pads If you don't have the pee pads just use paper towels all through the bottom take the wood chips out usually you can put those in when they're a little bit older and there should be a switch on the plate that says heater or brooder Make sure it's on brooder unless you don't have a switch that says it. Cuz the heater is really hot so you want to make sure the switch is on bruder but take the wood chips out right away and put paper towels or pee pads I just repeated myself I'm sorry.

 

[Chickandducklover]

So update this morning…all are still alive! Since last time they died on day 3, I feel like if we make it through tomorrow we hopefully will be out of the woods.

 

[Meyer_Hatchery]

@Chickandducklover glad to hear that they made it through the night. Lots of folks have given you good suggestions here. I'd suspect too that it has something to do with incubating, hatching, and brooding ducklings and chicks together. As you probably already know, ducklings are incredibly messy in their brooder and will make the litter wet almost immediately as they play in their water. Chicks cannot handle the amount of wetness in a duck brooder.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

I use a plastic bin as a brooder, and have incubated ducks and chicks (and brooded ducks and chicks) together. Runs out of space, quickly.

Put me in the camp of general agreement with the above posters. Almost every time I've had an issue with cleanliness sanitation of the incubating eggs (from my own flock) its been due to something colonizing a duck egg and from there killing other incubations. So my success rate where ducks have been involved have been very low.

Once born, I don't have the problems unless the ducklings have gotten everything wet - which they can do. I use old towels to line the brooder box - it provides traction for the ducks (really important to help avoid early leg development issues) which I remove and replace daily. Oxyclean, I find, is good to aid the laundry machine in removing "organics"from the towels between use.

I wish you every fortune in your hatchings, and hope you can successfully identify the cause before your next incubation effort.