Sick Chick Not Eating

[gfcm]

I can see where it comes in handy! I hope yours are fine now!

 

[Nicole01]

Thanks. I hope your chick is okay too. My Maple still has ruffled feathers, but the gasping for air and sneezing stopped. I think she will be fine. I just ordered some Sulmet as well just in case they get the dreaded bloody poops and coccidas(sp). I don't live near any stores that carry it. I also bought apple cider vinegar. I hear that helps too. I also use amoxicillan called fish mox. You can get that online or the pet store. It's pure amoxicillan and the same stuff you get from the pharmacy(amoxil).

 

[gfcm]

I hope Maple doesn't get that! I have three older chicks that showed signs and I treated within 2 hours. They are fine and thriving now. They are separated anyway because of their ages.

The little one isn't doing so good tonight. I did get the Polyvisol and I started her on Corrid for the dreaded. I saw some blood in your stools. It was a very minute amount, but enough to treat. I actually put the her pen mates on it too, as a precaution. I didn't want to treat for no reason, as I've heard this is bad. But well; not that I've had some have it...

You know what's really strange? I put her back with the others because she peeped a lot at 1st. I know birds will usually pick on a sickly chick, but they have really 'babied' her. When I was trying to get her to drink while she sat on my hand, one of the older chicks that's in the pen came up and 'seemed' to have gotten her to drink. (Like a mother hen). She did the same thing when I put her by the feeder. And then when the sickly chick stumbled off to a corner to sleep the older chick followed and laid with her wing over her!

I don't know. Maybe I'm reading too much into a coincidence, but NONE of the other chicks pick on her. They might accidentally step on her once in awhile, but that's about it. I sure hope she makes it! (Sigh)

 

[WhiteMountainsRanch]

Quote:

I second the part about Cocci, it seems to be going around right now and yours are showing the symptoms of it.

 

[gfcm]

Yep. I believe it was. She passed away during the night. I found her next to a pile of bloody poo. Thank goodness I had started all the other chicks on the Corrid!

 

[LizaBlue]

Sorry about your chickie, GFCM, I had a baby die 1:30 this morning. Lethargic for 10 days, but she would occasionally eat, drink, and poo, and the other chicks seemed to baby her too. Her poo looked fine, eyes clear, no mucous, and except for a random sneeze or two and some deep breathing she seemed to have no other symptoms until last night. We'd tried everything short of the PolyViSol - sugar water, Sulmet, egg yolk, egg yolk-honey-yogurt-oatmeal mash, etc. - making sure she got fed and watered. My inlaws brought me sick turkeys and perky guineas yesterday as a "surprise" and dumped them in the pen with my babies

They adopted Mopey-chick, so against my better judgement, when we put the kids up yesterday, she went into the brooder with the newbies while the rest of the kids went back to their house. Seemed good for a while - she seemed healthier than she had in days, the guineas tried to make her mama, crawling under her wings, even one of the turkeys tried to get under her when it got scared, even though it was almost as big as her. Now before you call me a complete fool, we did not realize the turkeys were sick, we just thought they were stressed out from the long drive and being dumped outside for the first time, and being thrown in a pen with 16 month old strangers. It wasn't until 6hrs later we realized they were more lethargic than Mopey-chick and that 2 of them couldn't breathe through their nose. 11hrs with the turkeys and Mopey was breathing the same way, had a few mini convulsions (could have been full-body struggles for air, idk), and died with a little clear mucousy spittle coming from her mouth. By 3am hubby was back from Walmart with PolyViSol, codliver oil, and canned catfood -all the helpful hints he'd read up on for sick poultry- and we were doctoring the turkeys like crazy. I didn't go to sleep until 5:30 this morning, heard hubby say something around 8 about "I've tried for an hour to do something with those turkeys and I can't get them to do anything - you'll have to mess with them." I woke at 9:45 and am so disheartened I haven't even checked on my healthy chicks except to peak at their thermometer, I've just been looking up stuff online. After spending hours every day holding, hand feeding, and babying Mopey, I hate to say this, but I almost hope I walk in to the brooder and find 3 dead turkeys. Mother's day is hard enough for me since my only real baby is in heaven, I just can't take investing time in animals we're going to slaughter anyway and have them die slowly.

 

[WhiteMountainsRanch]

Sorry for everyone's loses...

It is hard, and they are so fragile...

Liza- I had some chicks do the exact same thing yours is, breathing heavy, slightly lethargic, and an occasional sneeze. It turned into full-blown cocci, I got Sulmet the next day, but for several of them it was already too late. The rest were fine. It comes so fast. It's carried in by wild animals and it's in the dirt.


Here is my treatment:

Bring in house and keep isolated and warm.

Sulmet in Water.

ACV in Water.

Rooster Booster vitamins and Probios in water.

Kitten milk with more Rooster Booster slowly dropper fed into them so they get nutrition, several times a day.

For the very last one, he wasn't clearing up so I started giving Azithromycin .03 once per day... he is just recovering now and looks better than he has in a long while.

Hope this helps someone!

 

[LizaBlue]

Quote:
I think the turkeys might have cocci, some of the poo was suspiciously orangey - like mustard and ketchup mixed, but Mopey never had diarrhea or reddish poo, although occasionally it had a little yellowish milky liquid with it, but I was mixing orange jello powder with his Sulmet water to make it taste better.

Questions: what is ACV? is Rooster Booster and electrolyte solution like Sav-a-Chik? is giving live culture yogurt okay instead of Probios? where do you get Azithromycin?

Frankly, after reading so much today, I'm wondering if they have Aspergillosis (sp?). They really seem at death's door now, one won't even swallow when egg mix is put in mouth, just breathes around it.

Keeping them isolated from guineas and both isolated from my other chicks, also taking care of my healthies first, washing up real good all around, and Sulmet for everbody. Heck, if I don't start feeling better soon I might start taking it, lol!

 

[gfcm]

ACV is Apple Cider Vineager

Cocci is vicious and cruel! At least we have the support of one another here! (Liza, I am especially sorry for your personal loss of your real baby!)

The other chicks seem to be okay. I'm guessing I caught it early enough for them and the fact that they are probably healthier all around than the one was. Today I went and got meds for one of my older hens. She has the symptoms of gapeworm! Does it ever stop???

I've been letting them free range for a couple hours in the evenings (totally supervised of course, because we have hawks). And our dumb butts were digging up worms to give them. (Sigh. Live and learn). I noticed a couple of days again she was making this weird noise once in awhile. Like trying to clear her throat or maybe congested. This morning I noticed she was shaking her head and doing the noise more. I researched and decided to treat her for it. It's Invermic, so it's an all around wormer too. Wasn't cheap either! I think I've spent more on the chickens than I've spent on myself in awhile! But I love them and want to take good care of them.

While I was at TSC, I picked up some antibiotics and buckets since I had ordered the chicken nipples already to make waterers. I love the idea of keeping their water cleaner! That has to help in their health! I picked up some DE too, and will start treating areas with that. Some say it works, and some say it doesn't. Can't hurt, right?

A couple of weeks ago when the 3 older chicks came down with cocci I had gotten sick as well. They say it was food poisoning. I was pretty bad for a few days. The last day I was sick is when I picked up the meds for cocci for the chicks. My daughter and her dad asked if I could take the meds too. lol

I've only had all the chickens since April 12th and have already learned a lot about illnesses and such. I prefer to learn by reading, not by doing...

Liza, I hope the rest of your babies pull through this!

 

[LizaBlue]

I got my chickbabies the same day! Yeah, we were stupid enough to feed them worms we dug up once, but at least I washed mine, lol. But that was weeks ago, and all the others seem fine now...except...well, I noticed today many of their necks were swollen on one side. I figured it was their crop, and I had recently given them a treat, but no way any of them had gotten enough to swell them that big, so I got a hold of the first one I noticed and started massaging it and it feels pretty hard

I had left them out in the yard almost all afternoon yesterday and they love to eat the grass, so I'm a little worried. Looked up stuff on here and found Olive oil and yogurt were good cures for crop troubles - have you ever tried to feed that to a rowdy flock of month old chicks? Orange jello powder to the rescue. You can even get codliver oil down a half-dead turkey with orange jello. anywho. I took away their food - I've been a bad mama and leaving it with them round the clock. Hopefully things will look better in the morning, because at this rate, even if I have any survivors by the time their old enough to lay eggs, with my luck they'll all go egg bound and prolapse!