Help 1 week old silkies keep dying

[loveourbirds]

I'm thinking is your heat so that they can get under it, or get away from it? Do they stay in the warm side or the cool side more?
Are they really eating the crumbles? Or just looking like they do? I grind mine down because several times in the past, I realized at day 5 or 6 that they werent' really eating the crumbles. When I ground them down, they went crazy. Do you see them drink? Make sure they know how.

I love silkies. But they are dumber than dumb. I know if I moved their food 2 feet, they had a problem finding it, LOL.

Check your temps, grind the feed down, and do not give them anything else. And make sure they are drinking.

One other thing. I dont know much about respiratory ailments, but isn't there one or two that's carried in the egg and kills them at 4-6 days? It might be one of the ones they test for., like Pullorum.

Where did you get the silkies from?

yes pullorum and typhoid are both transmitted through the egg and both highly infectious to birds and humans. they are variations of salmonella and e. coli.

a responsible hatcher/farmer should realize a huge problem with the fertility of his/her eggs with either disease from what ive been told. thank God ive never had either one.

a disease im not sure about however is coryza. we have had it here, but never hatched any eggs when it was going on. back then we sold eggs for eating purposes and we just treated for the infection and discarded the eggs.

ok, we've probably scared everyone enough. yes all of these do exist, but hatcheries who ship their chicks are tested for this, look for NPIP logo. this does not mean their birds are 100% disease free, but it is a reassurance that they highly contagious highly fatal diseases probably aren't going to happen. when their flocks are tested, they don't always check every bird, but a sample from several birds in the flock. if everything comes back negative then they will give their approval for shipping.

most small poultry farms don't have a lot of problem with the illness mentioned above, a slightly higher chance if your showing your birds. because of this, and them not shipping their birds, they are not required to have the typhoid/pullorum test. a lot of more serious hobbyists and show people do have it done.

brian

 

[TNJEZ]

today is day 5 of this last batch and they are still all alive

. i have been giving them corid, as suggested. i also gave corid to my remining older few silkies from previous batches and some of my larger breed chicks. i saw a big improvement in activity of the chicks after two days.

i had some large breed chicks shipped to my from a major hatchery in march. i lost 19 out of 50 in that batch in the first week, and several after that. last year i had some shipped from the same hatchery twice and no problems only like 4-5 died. i was very disappointed this last time. after putting thought into it, all the chicks i've hatched have been dropping like flys since that shipment. so im going under the assumption its from that shipping batch that i gained all my trouble.

i clean my incubator each time i use it, but didn't clean the brooder out as much as i should. i keep newspaper in the floor of a rabbit cage, and wrap the cage with towels on 3 sides. they have a white light, and food scattered on the floor. i clean the waterer and change the newspaper twice a day. once i notice they are all eating and drinking, i move them to a large horse water trough, that has shavings on the floor. but when reading all these posts, i realized that i never cleaned the actual housing each time, after each movement. so its possible that the disease just lingered and moved on to my next batch of chicks.

both houseings have been cleaned and sat in the sun for a day to air dry and sun bleach out. i am hoping that this helps. im going to back off hatching for a while. i have one more batch of chicks hatching on tuesday (10 RIRs, 4 standard cochins & 10 silkies). fingers are crossed.

MY QUESTIONs:
1.) is 4 days of corid enough?
2.) and then retreat once in a week?

 

[loveourbirds]

4 days should be plenty, retreat in one week with 1/2 dose.

when I went though this I switched to medicated turkey starter, I do think the different medicine is what saved me. of course im just a dumb redneck so im not sure LOL.

im glad to hear your doing better.

what kind of silkies do you have?

 

[TNJEZ]

i have kind of a conglomerate of colors....white, paint, blue, splash, black, buff, cuckoo and the "i don't know" color. they are sweet i really enjoy them.

 

[loveourbirds]

silkies and cochins (bantams) are probably my favorite breeds to handle. the are (usually) so friendly and love the attention.

im not sure what and how you hatch, but when my bantams hatch I separate them from the standard fowl in the brooders. I also separate my old English bantams from my silkies and cochins. I have found that my larger birds will pick on them.

on silkies, I have black, blue, buff, and white. on cochins I have black, blue splash, blue mottled, lemon cuckoo, buff, and blue. all are bantam.

 

[TNJEZ]

i have a few standard breed cochins. i think i am going to try to get a few bantam cochins, i really like to cochins.

ive noticed that the large breed pick on the bantams. i keep them together for about 3 days then separate them into two different pens. thanks for the advice though.

 

[mzhof]

I'm thinking is your heat so that they can get under it, or get away from it? Do they stay in the warm side or the cool side more?
Are they really eating the crumbles? Or just looking like they do? I grind mine down because several times in the past, I realized at day 5 or 6 that they werent' really eating the crumbles. When I ground them down, they went crazy. Do you see them drink? Make sure they know how.

I love silkies. But they are dumber than dumb. I know if I moved their food 2 feet, they had a problem finding it, LOL.

Check your temps, grind the feed down, and do not give them anything else. And make sure they are drinking.

One other thing. I dont know much about respiratory ailments, but isn't there one or two that's carried in the egg and kills them at 4-6 days? It might be one of the ones they test for., like Pullorum.

Where did you get the silkies from?

I know this is an old, old post but I'm looking for what may have killed my silkie baby, he was 8 days old (no idea what gender but we called him Rocky). He was the most active one, always eating. I will say I never noticed them drinking when I dipped their beaks in the water they swallowed but never saw them near the water. I thought the same thing, these silkies are kind of dumb compared to my other 12 (only 3 weeks older but I keep them separated). The silkies cried a lot too I kept the temp as recommended. Came home today and he was on the ground, eyes glassy. Gave him some electrolyte water but he was gone within 30 minutes. Idk if I'll try any more silkies if they're that fragile.