Help... failure to thrive?

[PolarBerry]

Crossposting from emergency section.

These are 3 day old keets.

So I received my guinea keets from the post office yesterday morning. They did fine all yesterday and overnight. This afternoon I found one dead sprawled out and another seems to have no muscle control. Like the poor thing has vertigo flopping all over. I also have one keet who hasn't grown since arrival but is still walking and eating.

I have them on a 28% turkey/game starter and am keeping on non slip drawer liner with paper towels. Water has been served warm and with probiotics and changed every few hours. Keeping a warm spot of about 95-97 (has best spread out of chicks).

I have 7 turkeys and had 22 other keets in the brooder. All the other keets have doubled in size.

I've removed the dizzy one and the runt so they don't get trampled or cannibalized into a 10 gallon tank with a thermostat holding at 96. I have made them a fresh batch of electrolyte water with a sprinkle of sugar and put mashed food around them. I dipped their beaks as I did to all the rest upon arrival.

Any help for them or are they just failure to thrives?

 

[PolarBerry]

2 dead and 1 dying... no responses?

 

[pattyhen]

I'm so sorry for your losses. It does sound like your feeding them right and the temp is right. I wish I could help you but I don't have any answers.

 

[PolarBerry]

3 dead but no weird symptoms other than sudden seizure and death. The food shows no signs of mold but to be on the safe side (saw one poo with slight red tinge) I have them on corrid in their water in case it is coccidia. All the rest are peeping away and running around. I've cleaned everything and have given them food on paper plates/the ground so all can reach. Temps around 95-96 with an area available for cooling off. No drafts or chemicals in use. Hopefully this helps stop further loss.

 

[PolarBerry]

So no more have died but have one starting to look a little runty. Been dipping his beak in the water and put him near food but he seems less active/inclined to move. I don't think it is splay leg since he can walk but just would rather rest.

I've noticed it's only the pearl guineas dropping off. I have 11 purples with now 8 pearls in the brooder. Temps are holding steady at 96-97 (when I lowered it then they dogpiled so I raised it up again).

I also hammered some of the crumbles to dust to sprinkle around for them.

 

[PolarBerry]

So I've now lost 10 keets and 1 turkey... I'm probably going to go get some antibiotics to treat them with as a Hail Mary kind of thing... the hatchery is confused by why this is happening since after a long discussion with their guinea person she says it doesn't seem related to housing errors and that I've got them housed and fed right.

So disheartening...

 

[BlueShadow]

I am sorry, I don't know anything to help you. You are doing all the right things, giving them the right feed and water. The only thing I would caution is to make sure they have fresh water and electrolyte water. Usually the electrolytes aren't mixed very strong, so it doesn't matter, but if there are too many electrolytes they actually can get an overload of them. I don't really suspect this with your birds, but it is something to be mindful of.

Usually when things like this start happening, I suspect something at the hatchery. So many different things can go wrong during incubation, and it always seems to favor one particular breed/variety, which makes me very suspicious of something at the hatchery. One batch of eggs wasn't cleaned properly, a tray not cleaned, some dirt in the hatcher, could be at any step in the process. Maybe even the breeding flock, if the ration happened to be deficient in protein or an essential vitamin. It is just so hard to know what really is the problem.

Unfortunately that doesn't do anything to change your situation. For the little encouragement it is, you are doing all the right things. I am sorry for all the losses, you have had a rough start to guineas. I hope they start doing better for you soon.

 

[BlueShadow]

Oh. You don't need to bother with the corid, coccidia won't be causing disease at their age. It takes several weeks for coccidia to run through their life cycle to start to cause disease. I haven't familiarized myself with the species of coccidia that infect poultry, but for the species that infect sheep/goats/cows, its 3 weeks.

You can keep them on it at preventative doses, if you want, but you don't need to have them on corid at treatment doses.

 

[PolarBerry]

They are no longer on corrid.

The remaining pearl guinea you can feel his breastbone easily. He eats well and I've seen him drinking but I just don't know what is causing this. I've written down which types have died what days.

One thing I noticed on the last keet that died he had a slight green poop come out post-mortem. Like wasabi green color. None of the others have had that. Seems to point towards an inability to digest foods... so maybe they are just SDS chicks?

 

[BlueShadow]

Poop color is such an ambiguous thing, if it is off-color that could be totally normal or it could mean disease. Off-color is a little more likely if the bird isn't feeling well, but it does not point to a specific disease. Are you seeing any specific symptoms, or just vague lethargic/flopping around/dead?