Sick baby chicks....... 4 weeks old...... PLEASE HELP!!!!!!!!

[cinders76]

I bought a bunch of chickens from MYPETCHICKEN.com. I had them vaccinated for mareks disease by my pet chicken.
They are exactly four weeks old and many of them have become sick and died. here are my symptoms. can any help me?

Baby starts with wings hanging low
then unable to walk much. spends entire time sitting.
will move if started.
then progresses to not being able to walk at all.
jerks about if startled but cant walk like a normal baby.
flops a lot
no use of legs at all
eyes are mostly close.
if you hold the baby the head drops and eyes close.
then dies.
this all has occurs within 48 hours.
in the last 4 or 5 days we have lost a ton of babies. 30+ percent of all ordered have died in the last few days or look like they are on deaths door.

I have hand fed them.
I read an article on here about a food mixture.... yolk, honey, baby rice and so on.
I have feed that to sick ones and they still die.

I have done the vitamins in the water for the past two days.
New bag of food
and more keep getting sick.

the latest one seams to be shaking a bit
some sit upright and other can only lay on side with legs spread out.
Might have color loss in legs. hard to tell but one looks pale.... or paler than I remember.

The my pet chicken rep says it is now mareks because it is too early in life and no such a large group would die so quickly.

I am not new to chickens. I have done this for awhile. We have lots of older birds and never had anything like this happen...... with any of the babies we have raised.

Please help me before I lose them all. Totally heart broken :-(

 

[DraigAthar]

The symptoms sure sound like Marek's, especially the splayed legs and flopping about. Your rep seems ill-informed, because in un-vaccinated flocks Marek's typically has a 60-80% mortality rate. It's possible that there was a mix-up and your chicks were never vaccinated. I've heard of it happening before. And they are not too young for it. It is less common for them to get it that young, but not unheard of. There are a few other diseases that can cause neurological symptoms, but Marek's is probably the most likely.

What do the droppings look like? Have they stopped eating, or do they continue to eat right up until they die?