Dead Chick with Green Vent area?

[Embuck]

Man, nothing like an emergency to get me to log in after months.

So, I have this dead chick. She was about 2.5 months old, a Red Sex Link. She was dead in the chick-house this morning. There was no sign of predation. They have plenty of food and water.
I had a quick look at the corpse, and the skin around and below the vent area was quite green. The vent looked a bit odd, but I didn't look all that closely. Other than that, the corpse appeared normal.
There was another dead chick yesterday, but I assumed she had been injured and simply died. Her corpse had been a bit cannibalized by the others, though, so I couldn't really tell if anything was amiss.

If anyone can help me understand the cause of these deaths, it would be greatly appreciated. I really don't want to have a massive death toll in this flock.

 

[Kiki]

I am sorry for your loss.
Are you sure these chicks have been eating and drinking well?
The green poop could be a sign of not doing so or an infection.

Are you in the US?
You could send the body for a necropsy to your state lab.
Necropsy and disease testing lab info

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Man, nothing like an emergency to get me to log in after months.

So, I have this dead chick. She was about 2.5 months old, a Red Sex Link. She was dead in the chick-house this morning. There was no sign of predation. They have plenty of food and water.
I had a quick look at the corpse, and the skin around and below the vent area was quite green. The vent looked a bit odd, but I didn't look all that closely. Other than that, the corpse appeared normal.
There was another dead chick yesterday, but I assumed she had been injured and simply died. Her corpse had been a bit cannibalized by the others, though, so I couldn't really tell if anything was amiss.

If anyone can help me understand the cause of these deaths, it would be greatly appreciated. I really don't want to have a massive death toll in this flock.

I'm sorry for your loss.
If you still have the body, refrigerate it and send it to your state lab for a diagnosis.
Alternatively, if you want to perform one yourself, post some photos as you go along and we may be able to help you with what you see.

Green skin can indicate bruising, but you mention you didn't look that closely - you would need to examine the body more carefully to tell us whether it looked like bruising or possibly infection under the skin.

If you are having more than one die in a very short period of time, evaluate your space, feed and take a good look at everyone's poop. At the very least collect some stool samples for testing.

 

[Embuck]

Necropsy is expensive. Granted, so is a massive death toll, but I don't think the deep pockets are going to spring for it all the same.

I did cut open the corpse (highly ineptly, I might add). All the organs looked normal. Crop and gizzard were quite full. Unfortunately, the pictures I took did not come out well - to look at them, you'd think the bird died of argyria! Very dark/gray.

I still am not sure whether the green looked infected or bruised - are there any side effects of either I might have noticed? It did go down into the meat, which was more yellow than green. It was on her entire rear end; starting below the tail, and extending to her keel bone, and reaching about to her back legs on either side.

Food and water are plentiful and accessible. They had recently been allowed outside for basically the first time, so they've been gorging themselves a bit on the fresh stuff.
(Normally, I let chicks out sooner, but there had been too much rain/cold weather for that.)

 

[Wyorp Rock]

I have no idea

 

[kissezmychicken]

The green sounds like bile. I wonder if her digestive system was blocked?

 

[Embuck]

I couldn't see any sign of blockage... There was bile around, but only because I ruptured the gallbladder. (facepalm emoji)
New theory:
Maybe the green was just bruising. I've seen these kids falling off stuff all the time - their roost being a major offender.
And maybe she smothered to death. Please, does anyone have any advice to keep 2.5 m/old chicks from piling up in the corners at night? They've been doing it ever since I weaned them from the heat lamp, while only about a dozen actually use their nice ladder roost.
Anyway, I did find her where they pile at night.

 

[Kiki]

Block the corners off with a piece of wood.

 

[Embuck]

Good idea - I've had problems using cardboard; chicks got stuck. I actually put two feed buckets and a concrete block in the corner area, so maybe that'll help.

 

[Kiki]

I used a wire critter trap cage in the corner. That way if they did pile up, they could still breathe. It worked, they stopped suffocating. And when you have 4,300 chickens, it works

How many?