Chicks not growing.

[Guinea Goonie]

I have hatched out a few clutches that frankly the genetics was a little iffy. If the chick was pretty small out of a fairly small egg sometimes the process of growing just takes on a time line all to itself. We have hatched out Bantams, blacktails, saramas and a few other small breeds. Some of these chickc were just tiny. You may have an instance were a questionable pair of chickens mated and produced something you are not thinking would come out of an egg. I have a few silkie/leghorn mixes. They are cute as can be, but they are more leghorn than silkie. On the other side of the spectrum we have a few Bantam/silkie mixes. Now these are cute little chicks, but they are TINY. Yes, someday we will have to seperate them, but in the short run we will not incubate any more "questionable eggs". We did have fun though and they will all have a nice home. We hatched out one that was unidentified until it got to be about 3 weeks old (I got a bantam/wild red jungle fowl) cute little sh-t. I also have a few other red jungle fowl that are not true to the breed. I will sell these to people I know that want eggs only. The red jungle fowl hens are prolific layers and the eggs are nice big brown ones. The roosters are more " lawn candy " than anything else, people just love em, they are gorgeous.

 

[basicliving]

I got 4 White Faced Black Spanishes as day old chicks. One of them was very tiny and she developed more slowly than the others. She was always full of spunk though, and never took any poop off anyone. She was just a little runt. But she hit a growth spurt and by the time she was 8 or 10 weeks old, I could no longer tell her from the others.

I guess somebody's got to be the runt! Looks like you got two of them!

Enjoy your babies,
Penny

 

[Momma_Cluck]

We have 2 from our mixed flock that also failed to thrive-- turns out they were being bullied away from the feeder till there was little left over for them!
We separated them by taking them indoors (pet carrier in daughters room) and t now, after 3 weeks, they are the same size as their flock-mates!

They are being re-introduced to the flock Saturday....

coddling does wonders!

 

[joerogrz]

Thanks for the advice everyone. I separated the runt and the big runt (oxymoron?) along with another that wasn't feathering out or growing as well. Gave them some water with a poultry supplement and some GroGel. The didn't touch the gel, but did drink a little of the water. When I released them back with the others, all three went straight for the feeder. Mind you they had feed when they were separated. All three were eating and none of the rest were bothering them, so I guess all is well. The runt was running over the rest to get to the feed, so it does have some spunk.

 

[chickenannie]

you might want to stick a thermometer under the heat lamp, just to make sure the warmth is high enough. I know when I first started with chicks, it seemed like a sauna temp to me, but it's what they needed. Also, I"ve heard of brooders that are drafty, where the heat is escaping. just a thought.