I bought 7 DBrahmas in July. They hatched on July 1. Six of them are now large, strapping healthy pullets, not laying yet, but growing well, eating well, and making hen sounds instead of chick sounds. The 7th one has not grown noticeably at all in about 6 or 7 weeks. She is still peeping like a little chick and seems very needy. She follows me around until I pick her up and if I don't feed her separately from the other chickens, her crop is consistently empty. At dusk she comes to the fence gate and peeps piteously until I go in and put her on the roost in the henhouse. I am worried about this little chicken...as she just grew normally for about 6 weeks and suddenly stopped. She does eat well when I hand feed her and I have seen her eat very well from a feed dispenser with typical starter/grower feed in it. I have not noticed other chickens picking on her, or running her off from the feed dispenser, and she has no visible injuries. The only other chicken that I have that seemed slow to grow and was kind of weak is a smallish EE hen. She finally got to a fair size and now lays the largest egg of all my chickens. You can hold her or pet her and tell that she is filled out and very sturdy, but she was kind of like this chicken I have now. Does anyone know what causes a chicken to grow so slowly. I think this DBrahma is a good bit slower than my EE chicken was. Thank you.
