Help! Vet is out of ideas...

[BeardedHenHatchery]

Hello!

I've been raising chickens for a very long time and normally don't have any issues with my chickens. Then about 2 months ago I purchased some new chicks from another farm that seem to have brought something with them that I can't figure out how to treat.

It starts with the chick being a little lethargic, sleepy, and slow to eat, then they just stop eating all together and stop drinking, within a few days the chick is dead. There's no sniffles, sneezing, watery/bubbly eyes, lesions, sores, pasty butt, puffy crop, anything.... they just get lethargic and die.

We've tried 2 types of antibiotics, corrid, probiotics, poultry cell, 2 dewormers, the anti-fungal powder used for brooder's pneumonia, garlic, basil, red pepper flakes, etc.

I've completely dismantled the three brooders I have, bleached them, sun-dried, and aired them out then baked the shavings and put them into the brooder trying to figure out how it's effecting all 3 brooders when the new chicks only were in one. at this point I lost 50% of my youngest brooder, the chicks are about 3 weeks and are thriving again. I lost 90% of the brooder with the chicks from the other farm in it (but only lost 1 chick of the 5 from that farm), and about 40% in the 3rd brooder.

The oldest chicks I lost were about 3 month old D'uccles that were fully feathered (these are still struggling).
the youngest were the brooder of week old chicks with a mix of cochin and D'uccles (these are thriving now).
The other brooder has about month old chicks with D'uccles + Orpingtons.

I honestly thought I was in the clear as we hadn't seen any recent issues for about two weeks. Then two of the 3 month old chicks showed symptoms and died. Now one of my chocolate orpingtons is showing the same signs and 2 of my D'uccles are showing symptoms again... They were all ok weight but are rapidly loosing weight now.

Currently I've made up a mix of sugar water with B vitamins, electrolytes + probiotics since I'm out of nutri-drench... I've been syringe feeding and hand feeding a combo of chick feed and dried mealworm (he grabs them and swallows the whole little ball) but he keeps falling asleep mid bite. it started 3 days ago and he's getting worse. Regular Vet is no help and I have no avian or poultry vets in the area.

Last week I did Fenbenzole (3ml per gallon) in the water to deworm, and had another dish of probiotics/electrolytes trying to replenish from last week.
the week before I had done 5 days of antibiotics in the water (as the best suggested).

Any suggestions would be VERY appreciated

 

[BlindLemonChicken]

Has the vet tested for bird flu? Although I wouldn’t recommend actually doing that because if they test positive the chances some authority will show up an euthanize your whole flock are high…it sounds like it could be that. If it is I would personally let them ride it out because the survivors should have some resistance.

 

[PopoMyers]

@azygous @DobieLover

 

[BeardedHenHatchery]

Has the vet tested for bird flu? Although I wouldn’t recommend actually doing that because if they test positive the chances some authority will show up an euthanize your whole flock are high…it sounds like it could be that. If it is I would personally let them ride it out because the survivors should have some resistance.

My flock is AI negative (just tested in August for NPIP and AI)

and the other breeder was supposed to be negative AI too according to their NPIP papers… but i picked the chicks up from their house where they were supposedly inside… mine haven’t been outside yet and none of them have been outside since. So we didn’t test… but i guess they could have forged the documents?

 

[BlindLemonChicken]

but i guess they could have forged the documents?

I am not familiar with the process but I suppose it could be that or they hadn’t had a test in a while. Seems silly to risk NPIP status to sell sick birds. I bought chicks from an operation once that had been fine for years then started having high mortality. They defended themselves by saying they were just a backyard family operation but they were in fact a legitimate business and soon went out of business after numerous complaints on social media. I don’t recall if they were NPIP but at $15 a chick a 50% mortality rate was too much for me to stomach. Do you know of other people who have had issues with this farm?

 

[BeardedHenHatchery]

I am not familiar with the process but I suppose it could be that or they hadn’t had a test in a while. Seems silly to risk NPIP status to sell sick birds. I bought chicks from an operation once that had been fine for years then started having high mortality. They defended themselves by saying they were just a backyard family operation but they were in fact a legitimate business and soon went out of business after numerous complaints on social media. I don’t recall if they were NPIP but at $15 a chick a 50% mortality rate was too much for me to stomach. Do you know of other people who have had issues with this farm?

I haven’t heard anyone complaining about them as of yet. at least not in the breeder’s groups i’m in. i’ll do some digging to find out

 

[Slikie the silky]

Has your vet done an autopsy? Sometimes illnesses are easier to diagnose when you do an autopsy

 

[BeardedHenHatchery]

Has your vet done an autopsy? Sometimes illnesses are easier to diagnose when you do an autopsy

Not yet, my vet reluctant to do one cause our county and state is very “cull happy” for anything that could possibly be AI, including all types of flu and viral Respiratory infections. my vet is kinda playing dumb right now cause they’d have to report it if it was AI… Locally 3 breeders have lost all their birds… 1 actually tested positive for AI and the other two were simply suspected. Is there another way to get answers?

 

[azygous]

Many years ago here on BYC, we had a post similar to yours where chicks were dying for no apparent reason. No one could figure it out. Then the original poster disappeared from the site.

One year later they returned, and the mystery was solved. They said they had been forced to move due to their water being contaminated. This contaminated water, while not making the humans especially sick, was what was killing the chicks.

Ask your health department how you can get your water tested. Meanwhile, it might be wise to use bottled water until you can rule this out as the cause of your high chick mortality. Just because it hasn't happened in the past doesn't mean that something isn't contaminating your water now.

 

[Slikie the silky]

the first two that come to mind are fecal testing and feed testing