Second sudden death within three weeks

[CHlCKEN]

The second sudden death of one of my chickens occurred sometime within the last two days, and the reason why I cannot be specific on when exactly that was is because it happened while my birds were under the trusted supervision of someone else who had offered to take care of them for me while I was away between Thursday-Monday with friends. This frustrates me as much as it does is because I did have expectations that my birds would be checked up on, especially considering the heat index during that week and the assumed heatstroke related death that had happened a few weeks prior. From what I’ve been told, the birds were not really checked on enough. I’m hesitant to write this up with the same causation as the last because I’ve kept poultry for about five years and for that to have never happened before now, and the first times it supposedly happened being so close together seems hard to believe. However, I’m seeing zero signs of infectious disease or possible illness. All of my birds have looked, and still do look perfectly healthy. If it were an infectious disease or something that would be reason for extreme concern, I’d expect it to spread through my entire flock pretty quickly and not take them each down so suddenly and sparsely. And even if were not that way, I’d still have noticed some minor symptoms. It’s also interesting to me that it’s my youngest birds who are dying and not the oldest ones, which makes me skeptical of illness. But obviously if it can happen once, it can happen again, and heatstroke seems the most likely. I’m still frustrated though that my birds were, allegedly, left unattended for about three days and therefore even if there were any signs, the people taking care of my birds didn’t have anything that they could report back. I’m not blaming the caretakers but I do feel that they could have better accomplished what I had expected them to do by actually attending to them and not just glancing at them every other day.

 

[ButtonHoarder]

I’m sorry for your loss @CHlCKEN
That sounds so frustrating

 

[MysteryChicken]

How old are your younger birds?

 

[CHlCKEN]

How old are your younger birds?

Oldest are almost 5 and the youngest had just turned 2

 

[Cinnamon Roll]

Sorry that happened!

Depending on the circumstances it could be a predator. We had a mysterious death of a young cockerel out in the woods and a few days later caught a big rat snake in the act of constricting a young pullet in our coop. I believe that the first death was also probably a snake and it just couldn’t actually eat the cockerel that it killed.

 

[MysteryChicken]

Oldest are almost 5 and the youngest had just turned 2

Any feed that's gone bad somewhere on the floor, or some other mold source?

 

[CHlCKEN]

Sorry that happened!

Depending on the circumstances it could be a predator. We had a mysterious death of a young cockerel out in the woods and a few days later caught a big rat snake in the act of constricting a young pullet in our coop. I believe that the first death was also probably a snake and it just couldn’t actually eat the cockerel that it killed.

Nope I know it wasn’t a predator, I have almost zero predator problem. From the description I was given, she died with her wings out laying on the ground with zero signs of struggle.

 

[CHlCKEN]

Any feed that's gone bad somewhere on the floor, or some other mold source?

No mold. Coop is plastic for one thing, and the food and water is clean and just fine.

 

[MysteryChicken]

No mold. Coop is plastic for one thing, and the food and water is clean and just fine.

Okay, had to rule that out.