How much should I be trying to get this crossbeak to eat daily? And can I train her to eat sideways?

[vivaciouswoman]

My crossbeak Elwood P. Dowd did just fine on his own. He grew up to be a huge rooster! He was never aggressive either. Unfortunately a dog killed him when he was 3.

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I just wanted to encourage you to let the chicken try on it's own. You never know what system they will develop to get the nutrition they need! Good Luck!

Wow! Is that a trick of lighting, or does that bird have cataracts? So sweet!

 

[GreatGranny]

My little crossbeak is not in terrific shape, but she does seem to be getting some pep back. We started hand feeding her (syringe with very thin food/water/vitamins/kombucha mix) about a week ago and have gone from 1-2 feedings a day to 6 feedings yesterday. I just don't know if it's enough, though. And I cannot keep this up!

TARGET AMOUNT QUESTION:
So, does anyone have any guidance on how much food and water a 122 gram chick should be getting per day? She's about 5 weeks old, much smaller than her incubator mates, and doesn't have much muscle or any fat on her bones.

TRAINING QUESTION:
Also, Little Miss Crossbeak pecks forward, in alignment with her top beak, but that doesn't get food into her bottom beak where it can be maneuvered by the tongue to the back of her mouth to her esophogus. She has to be fed on her left side, and I drop food in the middle of her bottom beak in order to get food down her. Is it possible to train a chicken to eat differently?? If not, there's no good long-term outlook here.


When we first noticed her beak problem at about 2 weeks, she looked like this:
View attachment 1472570

Now, she's looking more like this:
View attachment 1472574

Aww... And she looks to be such a sweet cutie
As you have read on my thread, vivasiouswoman, my Slappy is a hatchery chick and the worse cross beak case our vet has seen to date! It has not only affected her top beak but her body and internal organs as a whole. I was told to cull her but we have no gander and so there is no chance of her breeding. She is surviving and seems happy and even coos when she preens... At one point I thought she was going to starve to death because my husband refused to tube feed her, but he was right to let her learn on her own. The only hand feeding we did was to pull grass and greens for her! Other than that she learned to survive and that is the only reason she is still here today. She learned to feed herself! We have changed her food and it has helped immensely! Instead of staying with the small feed we moved to a thicker, crunchy type food and she seems to be able to take it in much easier! She is still thinner than the other girls but she is doing much better! She also has breathing problems because her top beak affects her nasal passages as well... Her bottom beak has moved too but she carries on, and we use deep buckets for water and a deep pot for her food.

 

[WVduckchick]

Wow, I have hatched hundreds of bantam cochin chicks, and I just noticed my first cross beak in there. This was a broody hatch, haven’t checked my records to estimate her age yet, but still a young pullet.
I brought her inside and trimmed the upper beak a bit, and put her back with her group for now. I have separated a couple of cockerels that I suspect are from her same hatch, but they ran from her.
So I put her back in the main pen until I can think about what to do with her. Having not noticed it until now, I feel bad, but I have so many chicks, I apparently just overlooked her.

 

[vivaciouswoman]

Aww... And she looks to be such a sweet cutie
As you have read on my thread, vivasiouswoman, my Slappy is a hatchery chick and the worse cross beak case our vet has seen to date! It has not only affected her top beak but her body and internal organs as a whole. I was told to cull her but we have no gander and so there is no chance of her breeding. She is surviving and seems happy and even coos when she preens... At one point I thought she was going to starve to death because my husband refused to tube feed her, but he was right to let her learn on her own. The only hand feeding we did was to pull grass and greens for her! Other than that she learned to survive and that is the only reason she is still here today. She learned to feed herself! We have changed her food and it has helped immensely! Instead of staying with the small feed we moved to a thicker, crunchy type food and she seems to be able to take it in much easier! She is still thinner than the other girls but she is doing much better! She also has breathing problems because her top beak affects her nasal passages as well... Her bottom beak has moved too but she carries on, and we use deep buckets for water and a deep pot for her food.View attachment 1482285

Wow!! I've been recording how much I'm feeding her and her daily weight since we started tube feeding. I can't wait to share that! But I'll wait a couple more weeks until I've got a nice graph!

At some point, this has to stop. I did watch her pick up one nugget of food at the table and get it into her throat. Other than that, she seems completely unsuccessful. She works nonstop out at the feeder, but her crop is always empty. *sigh* I'm not sure how to go from tube feeding to letting her figure it out on her own. We're pretty committed to her survival by now, so stopping will be hard, especially if she starts to drop the weight we've worked so hard to help her gain! Perhaps when she gets nice and rotund (I can't imagine that!), we can take a break and see what happens!

 

[vivaciouswoman]

Wow, I have hatched hundreds of bantam cochin chicks, and I just noticed my first cross beak in there. This was a broody hatch, haven’t checked my records to estimate her age yet, but still a young pullet.
I brought her inside and trimmed the upper beak a bit, and put her back with her group for now. I have separated a couple of cockerels that I suspect are from her same hatch, but they ran from her.
So I put her back in the main pen until I can think about what to do with her. Having not noticed it until now, I feel bad, but I have so many chicks, I apparently just overlooked her.
View attachment 1482375 View attachment 1482376 View attachment 1482377 View attachment 1482378

Awwwww! As you know, Little Miss Crossbeak's deformity didn't appear until she was 2 weeks old, and at that point it was pretty minor. By 5 weeks, it was as you've seen on this thread here and she was nearly starved. (Recap is for other readers!)

In general for crossbeaks, I'd say that it wouldn't hurt for you to learn how to Dremel her beak (high RPM with grinder attachment) in case you can get them aligned again that way. It's time for me to Dremel Little Miss Crossbeak's lower beak because it's getting long again and hard to reposition under her top beak during her physical therapy time with me. (I'm a personal trainer on top of everything else--Ph.D. former professor and current researcher and evaluator with my own consulting firm, mother, fitness professional, farmer, and chicken devotee--and I feel like I'm in my zone when I do that work!)

However, that sideways curve you've got there...Hmmmm...if top and bottom are still mostly aligned, she may be okay. Chickens seem aware of their top beaks (they can see them well, I suppose!), and if she/he can see the curve, perhaps adaptation will be a little easier? Keep an eye on it, though. Carefully grinding down that bottom beak might help them stay relatively well aligned. (Wow, I feel weird giving *you* advice!! But it's just as much thinking aloud for other readers.)

 

[vivaciouswoman]

Wow, I have hatched hundreds of bantam cochin chicks, and I just noticed my first cross beak in there. This was a broody hatch, haven’t checked my records to estimate her age yet, but still a young pullet.
I brought her inside and trimmed the upper beak a bit, and put her back with her group for now. I have separated a couple of cockerels that I suspect are from her same hatch, but they ran from her.
So I put her back in the main pen until I can think about what to do with her. Having not noticed it until now, I feel bad, but I have so many chicks, I apparently just overlooked her.
View attachment 1482375 View attachment 1482376 View attachment 1482377 View attachment 1482378

Yeah, as I look through your pictures again, it looks like the bottom beak is straight and the top is more crooked. Do I have that right?

The top is much harder to correct. You can only go to the quick and no further, and there's more room for that on the lower beak. From my experiences with Little Miss Crossbeak and watching a LOT of videos and reading stories/viewing pictures of lots of other crossbeaks, it seems like those whose bottom beaks are closer to straight do better. The can still scoop up food and water straight on, and once they get food to the middle of their tongue, that organ can take over and help get the food past the glottis and down to the crop. I think this one will not have as much trouble.

Of course, it goes without saying (but for posterity's sake, here it is...) that if you're going to clip or grind down the beaks, you need to have a styptic stick on hand. You'll get bleeding at some point, and you'll be glad you've got that blood stopper! And you don't want to put your baby back in with the flock with blood on her, because then she'll get picked on. As you told me before: the pecking order is real!

Again, you're FAR more experienced than I am, but I'll put this down for future readers: I prefer the styptic stick to powders because it's easier to administer quickly and with minimal mess. But there are good powders out there, too.

 

[Peppercorngal]

Wow! Is that a trick of lighting, or does that bird have cataracts? So sweet!

No cataract, it's his protective eyelid pulled over because of the flash. I think it's called the nictatiting eyelid. If you zoom in you can see it's pulled from left to right as you look at the photo. He had no eye issues!

 

[HenniesInMyHeart]

YOU ARE SO RIGHT!!!!!

I would actually say I'm MORE than proficient at this point. I've been doing it solo for a week now, at 3-4 feedings per day. And I'm teaching my squirmy 7 year-old daughter to do it so that she can take over when I'm on business trips. If I can manage all that--and working on a chick that started out at a mere 122 grams--I feel pretty solid in my skills. I'm going to upload some videos about how to make the tube feeding solution and how to administer it. It's not quite as good as having a vet show you, but it might be helpful for others out here in BYC-land!

ATTAGIRL! Best therapy ever for reviving crossbeaks! Videos are an excellent idea; please post them when you're done. I am thrilled that I said something useful. Too many people would cull a special needs chick and it's sad when there is such a quick, easy solution. You ROCK for doing this!

 

[casportpony]

How is she today?

 

[WVduckchick]

Yeah, as I look through your pictures again, it looks like the bottom beak is straight and the top is more crooked. Do I have that right?

The top is much harder to correct. You can only go to the quick and no further, and there's more room for that on the lower beak. From my experiences with Little Miss Crossbeak and watching a LOT of videos and reading stories/viewing pictures of lots of other crossbeaks, it seems like those whose bottom beaks are closer to straight do better. The can still scoop up food and water straight on, and once they get food to the middle of their tongue, that organ can take over and help get the food past the glottis and down to the crop. I think this one will not have as much trouble.

Of course, it goes without saying (but for posterity's sake, here it is...) that if you're going to clip or grind down the beaks, you need to have a styptic stick on hand. You'll get bleeding at some point, and you'll be glad you've got that blood stopper! And you don't want to put your baby back in with the flock with blood on her, because then she'll get picked on. As you told me before: the pecking order is real!

Again, you're FAR more experienced than I am, but I'll put this down for future readers: I prefer the styptic stick to powders because it's easier to administer quickly and with minimal mess. But there are good powders out there, too.

I am definitely not more experienced than you are with cross beak. I appreciate everything you have already learned and especially that you have shared it. The videos were great.

So far my girl seems to be feeding herself fine. I had noticed she was smaller than her siblings, but I do get some size range in my flock, so hadn’t really paid much attention to her eating.

So here’s my question... I had assumed that cross beaks were genetic. But with as many as I have hatched from this group of birds, I do have varied genetics, but not having another like this, I have to wonder if maybe it is an incubation issue instead of genetics. Have you looked into what causes it?

(The other slight cross beak I mentioned was a serama cockerel. The pullet is a bantam cochin. No possible relation. And I’ve never had any other seramas with it. I have had overgrown beaks that required minimal trimming, but not crossed)