Little Chick

[BirdLeaf]

This little chick is alive today due to excellent advice from this forum, and I just wanted to tell his story.

Meet Pepper! He pipped at the same time as his little red sibling but didn’t seem to hatch as fast. He was the second chick I ever hatched, and it wasn’t going well for him. About 2 hours after he pipped, the dreaded yellow foam started to erupt from his shell. I started googling and the results were awful as you may know. I started reading a few posts here and got a game plan!

First, I got a tiny syringe and started sucking out the foam as best I could, but it just kept coming. So, the next option was to help him hatch. This was where things got really hairy really fast. I soaked the shell in warm water (100 degrees Fahrenheit) while keeping his pip hole above the water. Then, I grabbed my tweezers and nervously started picking away at the shell. I nearly screamed when I started to see blood. I stopped for a few minutes and set the egg back in the incubator with a piece of paper towel touching the opening to absorb some of the foam. Pepper was fighting hard to get out of that egg, but just wasn’t making any real progress.

The foam was somehow still coming out of the shell! It was an ungodly amount of foam, how does it all fit in the shell?! So, I scooped him back out and started picking some more. Now yolk started coming out! How much worse could this get? Was I making a mistake? At this point I figured he was going to die whether I acted or not. I wanted him to live so badly, he hatched so late and my hatch rate was SO LOW! I needed him to live.

So I grab my syringe again, and an egg from one of my girls and sucked the yolk into the syringe and got him some yolk. He finally pushed the rest of the way out of the shell. He was so swollen looking, and kind of see through, and couldn’t get his feet under himself. Crap, he’s never going to make it I thought. But he made it through the afternoon!

I started googling more and learned that he wasn’t in the clear just yet. But, now he’s almost 2 weeks old and doing very well! Maybe it’s too soon to count it as a success story, but I’m hopeful!

Thanks for reading!

 

[Crazy for Chickens!]

That's awesome! I probably would have totally freaked out. I tried to help a chick once,and it ended up dying overnight... I'm glad he's alright. Congrats!

 

[Chickassan]

Awww, way to go Pepper! Good job on your end too! Watch out though, the ones you have to baby usually turn out to be spoiled brats.

 

[theoldchick]

Good for him and you for being so diligent with his care. I truly hope he continues to do well.

 

[BirdLeaf]

Thanks everyone I am super thankful to have found such good advice on this forum, without it I wouldn’t have him!

 

[N F C]

Go Pepper! That must have been nerve-wracking, glad to hear he is doing well.