i lost another chicken this morning!

[Sandrachx]

last december, i lost a youngster chicken that had been born last summer and didn't know what went wrong. i have been told "these things happen" but still felt i had done something wrong. in that case, she just kept putting her head in a corner away from the other chickens and me. being new at this, i thought she was just being picked on so i put her in a nest box for the night - found her little body in the morning.

today, i went out and found another young girl (sister) dead. she seemed to have been having a problem with the older hens in january (broken feathers, low weight, etc.) so we put her in a cage in the garage for all of february. she thrived, got more feathers, so we put her with the rest of the hens in mid-march. during her "hospital stay" she did lay 3 really wierd eggs - all mushy, but eggs. i thought it was because she was a youngster, not even 1 yr old yet. she too started isolating herself and i found her all alone yesterday, in the shade under the chicken ramp.

i've recently read that layer crumble should not be given to hens until they are 1 year old because they can get kidney problems. might this be why i've lost 2 of the young girls, because we switched them to the adult layer mix when they were too young? this is too sad...

 

[CUDA]

I'm not sure if this is your problem, but you shouldn't feed layer pellets until they are laying. I would recommend going to a non-laying pellet, and supply oyster shells for them in a separate bowl so they can eat it if they need it. This will solve your feed questions, but may not solve your problem. Good luck!