I have been able to get my four week old chicks to eat boiled eggs whey they wouldn't eat anything else. I have even had some success with the less ill ones by putting pieces of egg white into the water.
It seems to work great - just the whites though, not the yolks. In a shallow clear glass bowl, our four-week old babies "fish" for the pieces of boiled egg - often they "miss" and take several gulps of water before they get a piece of the food. I have to hold the bowl steady with one hand during the process or they would surely tump it over, but I have been pleased with the fluid intake.
And any rate as a bonus when they do get a piece of the egg it is wet with medicated water. If I drop the egg pieces in from above they think it's a bug or something and are even more excited about what's in the water. Three of them though were so quick they caught a piece out of the air before it hit the water container though - I was impressed!
Anything to get that medicine into them - we lost 10 in two days to a bacterial infection they got from the grass clippings we were using as bedding. Hard lesson learned.
Also I take the chick, stand at the sink, snuggle it against my warm tummy and hold it with my left hand, and with my right hand I have a deep-bowled plastic teaspoon that has medicated water in it. With gentle coaxing I can get the chicks to drink if only a little. With my left hand I stroke their head and dip their beaks gently into the water. I can get a little bit of medicine water into them that way and do it again every half hour to an hour, depending on how they are doing. It has been a very tedious process and been pretty-much my focus round-the-clock since Wednesday, but since we got this tetracycline water going we haven't had any die on us so that's good.
Best wishes
