keet and chick trouble

[white guinea333]

Hi I am new to BYC an I hope to ask some questions about all things poultry.

I have a small problem with some keets and chicks which I hatched out of a homemade incubator. The few that are already hatched and dried off are pecking each and I am afraid that they may start bleeding. I did put a couple of things in the brooder to entertain them like vegetable and fruit scraps, old egg cartons, and small red dinosaur toys. They are entertained by them but are still pecking each other. Any ideas on how can help or get them to stop?

 

[Kelsie2290]

Hello and Welcome To BYC! You might like to post in the Guinea forum about the keets. https://www.backyardchickens.com/f/45/guinea-fowl usually aggression/pecking in chicks is because they are crowded / brooder is not big enough, or too hot (make sure there are cool spots in the brooder), also using a red light instead of white and lowering the amount of light in the room may help... if they are just hatched like a couple of hours sometimes you do get one that is really persistent about picking at everything around it, make sure you have a lot of crumbles spread around on the floor for them to pick at and that they know where the water is, sometimes separating that chick for a couple of hours may help.

 

[TwoCrows]

Welcome to BYC!

Kelsie X2 First you need to go to the Guinea section and post about your keets. Next, make sure you are not over crowding or over heating them. All chicks go off on each other when they are hot and cramped. So use a good thermometer placed on the floor directly beneath the heat source. Keep the heat off to one side, food and water off on the other, temp around 90 degrees. Give them 1/2 square foot per bird for now and as they grow, they will need more in the brooder. You don't want the entire brooder to be the same temp. You DO want cool spots in the brooder for them to chill out in.

Good luck with your new babies and welcome to our flock!

 

[white guinea333]

I have my keets and my chicks in the same brooder. My brooder is made from a 40 gallon brooder and everyone does have 1/2 square foot of room the heat lamp is positioned at one end of the brooder to provide a cool spot on the other end. The temperature under the heat lamp is 95 degrees. I always spread their food out before anyone goes into the brooder. Could it be that the keets and chicks don't like each other and need to be separated?

 

[TwoCrows]

You might try to lower the heat. For some birds, 95 degrees is way too hot. I just brooded a batch of Barred Rocks and had to start them at 88 degrees to keep the aggressions down. So first thing, lower your temp. Without a doubt, birds fight when hot.

If all else fails, you may need to brood the keets separate from the other chicks. But try lowering the heat by 5 or 6 degrees first and see if that doesn't help.

 

[white guinea333]

I set the heat lamp a bit higher to decrease the temperature like you said and sure enough an hour and a half later there is little to no pecking around the chicks and keets. thank you for your help!

 

[TwoCrows]

Great that lowering the heat solved the issues! Enjoy your new babies!

 

[drumstick diva]

Two Crows really knows her business. Welcome to BYC and glad they are behaving now.

Come to think of it, I hate being hot when I am, I am crabby and don't want anything near/bothering me.

 

[white guinea333]

Ain't that the truth.

 

[joker468]

I observed with my keets in the brooder pecking at each other. I watched for a while and noticed they seemed to me to be preening each other, picking off dried matter from the hatch. After they were all clean the pecking stopped.