Shaking bad almost 2 weeks

[Hondamomma719]

We purchased 4 baby chicks from our local big r we noticed the one chick “pidgy” has been shaking uncontrollably. She is also a lot smaller than the other 3 and her shakiness causes her to have an unstable gait. She has been eating drinking and pooping normally. We started them all on a probiotic and electrolyte additive in their water. She doesn’t shake when held but her head does this twitching sort of thing . I have no idea wat to do or what it could be.all my other chicks are completely unaffected.

 

[Perris]

hello @Hondamomma719 , welcome to BYC

How long have you had them? How old are they? Were they all the same when you bought them or did you notice one looked somehow different at the time?

It is very unlikely to be anything to do with feed or water if the other 3 are fine. Either it's something congenital (she was born with some sort of defect) or she's caught something. If they've not been exposed to the outdoors yet, it's unlikely to be the latter. That's the best advice I can offer from the info you've supplied so far.

 

[Hondamomma719]

hello @Hondamomma719 , welcome to BYC

How long have you had them? How old are they? Were they all the same when you bought them or did you notice one looked somehow different at the time?

It is very unlikely to be anything to do with feed or water if the other 3 are fine. Either it's something congenital (she was born with some sort of defect) or she's caught something. If they've not been exposed to the outdoors yet, it's unlikely to be the latter. That's the best advice I can offer from the info you've supplied so far.

We bought them over the weekend and the store said they had had them since Tuesday. My son is the one who picked her out and she was kind of sitting off to the side by herself. We didn’t notice the shaking right away, but later that evening while we were still continuing to set everything up, we started to notice. We also noticed that she is somewhat smaller than the rest. Her shaking has gotten a little bit worse, and when we try and handle her, her shaking gets worse as well, but then calms down after holding her and comforting her. But then she does the switching head movements, which she normally doesn’t do by herself.

 

[Hondamomma719]

hello @Hondamomma719 , welcome to BYC

How long have you had them? How old are they? Were they all the same when you bought them or did you notice one looked somehow different at the time?

It is very unlikely to be anything to do with feed or water if the other 3 are fine. Either it's something congenital (she was born with some sort of defect) or she's caught something. If they've not been exposed to the outdoors yet, it's unlikely to be the latter. That's the best advice I can offer from the info you've supplied so far.

 

[Perris]

she's not well. It's impossible to know with what, but given the age and your inexperience, my advice would be to let nature take its course. Very few clutches of chicks see all of them make it to maturity, and you can make things worse by intervening. If the other 3 start picking on her, then is the time to intervene, either with interventions to try to save her, or with euthanasia to end her suffering.

Edited to add, for future reference, it's a bad idea to acquire birds that are self-isolating or otherwise behaving differently from the rest when buying; taking pity on them might lead to your healthy birds present and future getting sick. You are starting out with clean ground and want to avoid introducing common poultry diseases. Be very careful only to buy what looks like healthy stock.

 

[Eggcessive]

I would give her a chick vitamin that has vitamin E. It looks neurological, probably from failure to thrive or some unknown condition. She may not survive if she continues to not eat and get around as well. It is true that the others may trample her or get much larger than she, but you can try extra feedings of the vitamins and a bit of wet chicken feed and just a small bit of egg daily. Is she pooping normally, or has she had any pasty butt.

 

[Hondamomma719]

I would give her a chick vitamin that has vitamin E. It looks neurological, probably from failure to thrive or some unknown condition. She may not survive if she continues to not eat and get around as well. It is true that the others may trample her or get much larger than she, but you can try extra feedings of the vitamins and a bit of wet chicken feed and just a small bit of egg daily. Is she pooping normally, or has she had any pasty butt.

Yes she is pooping normal and no pasty butt and I’m definitely going to try those

 

[KayTee]

It's a sad but true fact of life that some chicks just aren't destined to survive. I have had chicks that hatched without problem, but that just failed to thrive. Something inside them (genetic or physical) just didn't work properly. There's nothing you can do for chicks like that, other than to end their suffering if they are really in pain. (A pair of garden shears has worked for me twice - horrible, but necessary).
Having said that, I currently have a hen who I was convinced wouldn't survive at 3 weeks old. I called her Quasimodo because she was hunched over, kept away from the others, wouldn't eat, was skinny... In the end she survived, is big and strong, and has had her name changed to Suzi Q, in honour of Suzi Quatro