My Cackle Hatchery NIGHTMARE! Ideas???

[WhispersToChickens]

I just need to vent...I placed and order with them and got a shorted order with birds dropping over dead. They sent 28 replacements and now over 1/2 of them are gone. Each day its 2 or 3 or 4. I just walked in from the brooder room and it was 3 today. They have PLENTY of ROOM and HEAT and FRESH WATER and ALWAYS FOOD IN FRONT of them AND ON PINE shavings...the SAME KIND I ALWAYS USE. Some get the droopy wings, most show no signs of anything and the next day dead. Yesterday one of the first batch older healthy polish fell over dead. Im in tears and out $150.00...the order was polish and silkies and the silkies are the ones falling over daily. Ive raised over 300 before they arrived with 2 losses, 2!!!! (they were not silkies except for aabout 10 of my own hatch) I even put some cackle chicks in with some of my own chicks in a seperate smaller brooder and guess which chicks fell over dead the VERY NEXT DAY...Cackles. My chicks are fine now days later so whatever it is it doesnt seem contagious. I cant even list symptoms...fine one day, dead the next. A few get a little weak and they are gone within hours.

ANY IDEAS ON HOW I CAN SAVE THE FEW I HAVE LEFT.
THey are on medicated chick starter and I do have some durimycin I could put in the water tho I havent.
Im ready to call them and give them a HUGE piece of my mind but that would be pointless.
Thanks for listening....

 

[Elite Silkies]

Do you grind up their food? Some of them will not eat the crumbles because they are too big. Put sugar in their water? You could also put the Vit/Electrolytes in their water.

But, if it's only Cackles, then I'm not sure what to tell you.

 

[chickenzoo]

I would contact the hatchery. You might try some baby parrot feeding formula, but it seems more like a failure to thrive.

 

[dirtdoctor]

Freeze the dead ones, and send them back to Cackle, and then send some to the College extension so they can test them for disease. Contact them first. No use having a disease sent across country infecting everything else.

 

[Sugar Sand Farm]

try giving them some ground up egg yolk They are used to eating that and it does have alot of protein.

 

[WhispersToChickens]

Well here is my FINAL OUTCOME with Cackle.....NO SILKIES LIVED, not even the replacements!!!!! 6 polish made it, lost 3 to predators, 2 to adult??? sickness (that no one else caught and they were caged (eyes got all puff and they fell over dead), 1 roo remains. The St Run Polish were ALL ROOS. ALL OF THE SILKIES an ALL OF THE MAKE UP SILKIES they sent DIED.

FYI I have raised my own, before and since, same brooders, same feed same set up and ALL LIVED. All of my adults that were chicks at the same time are now in the pens living happily with only a few free rangers lost to predators. So CACKLE...you got my money but lost my business FOREVER.

Cackle, bottom line...sells SICK CHICKS! (at least in the silke and polish dept)

 

[tamelroy]

I didn't read the whole thing, but I lost all of mine. Every one! I didn't go to cackle direct, there is somoneone on BYC that is a vendor and he goes through them. I don't know if it was mereks or what. All my birds from last year fine, but those that make it around 5 months tops and then they die. Now I am just worried to have enough birds for eggs this year I really don't want to buy them in the store. EWW!

All I know I will never ever get them from that vendor or cackle again! I will be lucky to have 4 girls next spring left. (those are my older girls!)

Good luck and I am sorry for your loss!

Tracy

 

[CityChicker]

I don't know what happened in your case, especially with the day-olds, but something almost identical happened to me with Greenfire. I have been shipping chicks for over 25 years with no problems. Maybe I have just been lucky until now. They sent me chicks a week ago and now 10 out of 14 are dead. These were obviously older chicks of mixed ages though, so I think that was the main source of the problem as some of the larger ones were dead in the box. I think what they did was basically starve and dehydrate the chicks to death. I'm sorry for your experience with Cackle.

 

[WhispersToChickens]

Wow, so Im not alone but I believe word of mouth is the way to get the word out! Cackle Sells SICK CHICKS...group hug and moment of silence for all of out sick chicks may they RIP. Well Im off to Ideal to get one more shipment before winter.... if gotten from them before in the past and all was well!

 

[Sir Birdaholic]

Hmmm... I've had great batches & no problems with Cackle, & ALL KINDS of trouble with Ideal.