chronic pasty butt chick is not drinking water 2 weeks old help!

Bazy

Songster
5 Years
Jul 4, 2014
296
57
136
Parker, Texas
This chick has had pasty but from day one. She picked all the down out to a quarter size bare spot and I have been up all night twice soaking her butt in warm water..slathering her cracked vent in antibiotic, massaging her tummy to make her poo. She feels great fir a while...eats like a hog...then pasts up again. Were talking CONSTIPATION...not just diahrreah clogging her vent. I think she's eating shavings and not drinking eater so I put her on paper towels with some day olds..and put her food in the water to entice her...not working. She is alert and hopps around.....UNTIL..constipation strikes again..and we are up all night. I've tried apple cieder, yogurt and considered culling...please help...
 
Fermented feed? Worth a shot.
Thank you. I got your reply last night and put a batch in to ferment. I swear I am going to switch everyone to fermented once I finally have my pens finished.

I wound up staying up half the night with this chick. I swear the thing doesn't drink water,so I removed all the food and left her alone for a while then went to pick her up and her crop was full of water and she spit up on me. I gave her a few grains of start and grow and watched her until she pooped..just water. So far, so good. She acts JUST like the 3 ONE day old chicks she is in with...pushing her way under them to snuggle and doesn't peck them at all. They actually peck her more. I'm wondering if she is brain damaged. She is acting pretty normal right now....for a day old chick, sleeping all the time and jumping up and running around at the slightest sound. She has stopped constantly peeping and straining to poo. I am just going to leave her with the babies and hope she re-programs to eat some grit and drink water. Her poo was very hard and fibrous when I had to help her with it. I think she may have been eating her wood shavings and no grit...and very little water in addition to her food. She is a normal size for a two week old chick. I put her and the day olds on paper towels for now.

Right now I'm just keeping my fingers crossed. Maybe she will be a good broody hen someday.
 
Quote:
Well, I'm going to update this because I appreciate when I have a problem and somebody reports back with updates... I tried fermented feed, and she wouldn't eat it. Seriously. I put it on the end of her beak, watered it down, strained it out, and she did not want it. Went on hunger strike. The other chicks would eat it, (and jump in it, and lay in it, and play in it, and poo in it) but she would not. Ok, well... I decided: No more heroics. I would not stay up all night for her any more. Her pasty butt got looked at a couple of times per day just like the others were checked... She was going to sink or swim. So I took the fermented feed away and only gave her and the other little ones start and grow and electrolyte water. Every couple of days I would dilute down some natural apple ceider vinegar and drop some to this one chick..so far so good. then added grit. She finally started eating the grit (when I took her food away for a few hours) , then FINALLY put her and the other (now two week olds) on pine shavings. ugh..chicks on paper towels for two weeks! ..She is eating, drinking and pooing normally for a three week old chick even though she is almost 6 weeks old and four times the size of her brooder mates. It's kind of cute to see her towering over them and they jump on her. When she lays down, they try to burrow under her and she just lets them..and if they get there first, she burrows under them! I have never seen her ever peck anyone. Hopefully she will continue to mature with the babies. I'm afraid to put her with her hatch-mates because they are so much further advanced than her. I'm thinking she had an immature digestive system. She came from a shipped egg, and who knows what can come of that... Thanks for helping me with suggestions, and just helping me THINK!
 

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