Need some help

[JonRigby2005]

I have 3 Black Australorps, which I got at the same time as chicks a little more than 3 weeks ago. One of them is significantly smaller than the other two. Today it looks like she might have diarrhea, but if it is it doesn't look too bad. She seems active and she is eating and drinking. Is she just a runt or do you think she may be sick or have some deficiency? We are feeding Nutrina Naturewise Chick Starter Grower, chick grit, treats here and there (cucumber, tomato, scrambled eggs), water with probiotics and a little apple cider vinegar. We did not vaccinate them or give them medicated feed. Any insight would be appreciated. I'm new to all of this.

 

[thepick4uchicks]

I have 3 Black Australorps, which I got at the same time as chicks a little more than 3 weeks ago. One of them is significantly smaller than the other two. Today it looks like she might have diarrhea, but if it is it doesn't look too bad. She seems active and she is eating and drinking. Is she just a runt or do you think she may be sick or have some deficiency? We are feeding Nutrina Naturewise Chick Starter Grower, chick grit, treats here and there (cucumber, tomato, scrambled eggs), water with probiotics and a little apple cider vinegar. We did not vaccinate them or give them medicated feed. Any insight would be appreciated. I'm new to all of this.

Hi. A little diarrhea is okay every once in a while they will do that and then tune up and be just fine. As long as you are feeding mainly the starter grower formula mostly and giving treats very frequently at this time you will be on the safer side. While on the starter you don’t even have to worry about grit unless you give treats. I would pull back on those for a few days and see if the loose stools didn’t clear up and see what happened from there. Also I would eliminate the tomatoes altogether especially until she got much older. Now that’s my opinion and everyone has one but I think she is too young for those because they are sort of a questionable topic for chickens anyway. If she continues the diarrhea and it gets really bad and the other chicks follow with it you may need to have them stool sample checked at the vet for coccidia and then treated for it. Then you would later put them on the medicated feed- maybe....that we would have to research. Mine were not vaccinated for it so I had kept them inside due to excessive heat where I live and I knew it was going to be late summer when I would be introducing them to outside so I put them on medicated feed and did the regimen of nine weeks and then off for three weeks before going outside. I hope she clears up just fine. Chicks that are raised outdoors often do just fine without being on medicated feed. As to her size. She will catch up with time. She might just be the runt if the litter. I had one of my three Creme Legbars like that and she is the second largest now. She will catch up. All will be good.

 

[dawg53]

I agree with @thepick4uchicks regarding stopping all the treats, probiotics, stop the ACV as well. Three week old chicks should only be fed chick starter feed and plain freshwater. Chick grit can be given in small quantities.