One week old chick had stunted growth; suddenly died.

[Trish1974]

Last Friday, 5/15, I hatched 4 eggs in the incubator, all 4 full siblings. By the fourth day I noticed one had started to develop wing feathers but then the growth stopped. By this Friday I could tell the chick's body was not growing either, and its wing feathers still didn't finish coming in like its siblings had. The funny thing is, this chick was vigorous, ate like a pig, drank very well, and had no pasty butt or odd poops. I found it dead under the heat plate this morning. I tried to do some online research, but all I came up with was malabsorption syndrome in boilers. These chicks are full Araucana. What could have caused this chick's stunted growth although it otherwise seemed healthy?

 

[Eggcessive]

Sorry that you lost the chick. I have not answers as to what was wrong.

 

[LaFleche]

Sorry for your loss.

What kind of Araucana, excaudate or tailed?

 

[LaFleche]

I have looked into your gallery and seen that you breed the tailless/excaudate variety.

Excaudate Araucana are known to have some genetically based issues mostly related to the digestive tract. This might have been the cause of this chick's stunted growth and death.

 

[Trish1974]

I have looked into your gallery and seen that you breed the tailless/excaudate variety.

Excaudate Araucana are known to have some genetically based issues mostly related to the digestive tract. This might have been the cause of this chick's stunted growth and death.

Hmmm... that's new to me. I've not come across that in my years of research of the breed or heard that from other breeders. I'll look into it though.

 

[coach723]

Some chicks just fail to thrive. Could be genetic, could be an incubation issue, sometimes it just happens for no known reason. If it becomes something that you experience more often, then I would definitely consider that you may have a genetic issue going on. I would carefully document the parentage of all the eggs you hatch, and see if there is a link to a parent bird. But one chick out of four, and a one time event, there isn't enough evidence to say anything for sure.

 

[LaFleche]

"...unusual tufts of feathers on the ears, and may be rumpless, without a tail and tail-bone; in the United States it may for this reason be known as the South American Rumpless. Both ear-tufts and rumplessness are caused by lethal genes, ..."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Araucana

 

[LaFleche]

There are a few other chicken breeds ( i.e. Krüper) which also have lethal factor disposition and the breeders have to take this special genetic trait into consideration when selecting birds for breeding.