Silkie Holiday Hatch-a-long

[why do birds]

So I gave the little weakling a warm bath and put him back in the incubator to dry. Once he is dry I will have to try to brace his toes. I'm not sure how to do it so if anyone has any advice I would greatly appreciate it. His rectum is out just a little to add to all this mess. Has anyone dealt with this? I'm so devastated over this. I'm almost wondering if it would be more humane to put it down? But how? I'm home alone, the kids are sleeping and I'm sobbing over this little guy. This is a cry for help.
What should I do?

I had one (of the 3) that hatched, that had a foot problem. He couldn't walk, and was all sticky. Several times a day I would pick him/her up and do "physical therapy". I started as soon as I got it out of the incubator. Just like humans, the feet are very flexible the first few days. This one, his left foot was curled bad and he couldn't stand on it at all. I took his little leg inbetween my fingers and moved it to where it should be, a more "normal" position. He couldn't walk for a few days, so I kept doing this physical therapy. I would show the chick that the toes need to separate, not curl, when I'd place him down in the bathtub (that's what we're using for a brooder/home for our birds). It took about a week and eventually it started walking correctly. I had to keep it's sibling from pecking it on the head. And it stayed all sticky and yucky for more than 2 weeks, until the baby feathers fell out. I'll get a pic up of our Fredo (named because it's sibling freed it from it's shell and started pecking Fredo in the head, Godfather-Fredo was shot in the head...). Fredo is now the biggest bird we have, and seems to be top of the pecking order.
For bracing I did see different "tricks", one person used a gauze pad to make the foot brace and put a plastic bag with little holes for the toes to pop through.

 

[KV Silkies]

ok, blood ring question... I have one egg I thought had a blood ring in it, I still have it in the incubator, is day 14 today, I am weighing and candling tonight. however when I last checked on the blood ring egg it is getting darker in there, I have not seen movement, or a black spot at any time to indicate an eye or any part of the chick. have heard I should remove blood ring eggs so they don't explode and contaminate my ONE good egg left.... just needed input on do I keep this blood ring egg in there as maybe it is a chick, or do I take it out so it does not effect my one good egg. also has anyone heard of a blood ring egg changing? or should it just look the same through out? i'm afraid it is rotting and getting ready to explode.... nothing smells yet... help!

 

[why do birds]

ok, blood ring question... I have one egg I thought had a blood ring in it, I still have it in the incubator, is day 14 today, I am weighing and candling tonight. however when I last checked on the blood ring egg it is getting darker in there, I have not seen movement, or a black spot at any time to indicate an eye or any part of the chick. have heard I should remove blood ring eggs so they don't explode and contaminate my ONE good egg left.... just needed input on do I keep this blood ring egg in there as maybe it is a chick, or do I take it out so it does not effect my one good egg. also has anyone heard of a blood ring egg changing? or should it just look the same through out? i'm afraid it is rotting and getting ready to explode.... nothing smells yet... help!

Hi, we thought we had these "blood ring" things too but they turned out to be chicks! Maybe because our chicks were dark feathered and black, silkies, it looked like this but wasn't really. Since we didn't know what to do, we left ALL the eggs in the incubator. Of 9: 1 was unfertilized, 1 didn't progress, and all the others had chicks. Looking at them early on, day 14 or so, we thought 3 of these may have "blood rings". I don't actually know what this is, a blood ring, and it seems like a term that expert hatchers use, so we left them all in and are oh so happy that we did! Nothing "exploded". If it were me, I'd keep them all in until day 21 or beyond! Maybe that one you're not sure of will hatch!

 

[why do birds]

@jorey It's okay. I feel like I did the right thing as hard as it was.

You did do the right thing! If the chick was in pain, it's not fair that it should suffer before it dies. Not all of them will make it! As promised, this is our Fredo, now at 4 weeks old, but it had only 1 bad foot and the foot corrected. It was Fredo's left foot that was bad at hatching. Fredo's a smooth sizzle (Silkie Cochin cross). If its feet didn't correct it's very possible that the other chicks would've hurt/killed it.

 

[KV Silkies]

Hi, we thought we had these "blood ring" things too but they turned out to be chicks! Maybe because our chicks were dark feathered and black, silkies, it looked like this but wasn't really. Since we didn't know what to do, we left ALL the eggs in the incubator. Of 9: 1 was unfertilized, 1 didn't progress, and all the others had chicks. Looking at them early on, day 14 or so, we thought 3 of these may have "blood rings". I don't actually know what this is, a blood ring, and it seems like a term that expert hatchers use, so we left them all in and are oh so happy that we did! Nothing "exploded". If it were me, I'd keep them all in until day 21 or beyond! Maybe that one you're not sure of will hatch!

omgosh, i would be soooo happy if it did hatch! I am candling again tonight, I think I'll try and get pics up here to get some insight too. altho I say this a lot and end up NOT getting pics. maybe tonight will be the night! thank you for your info.

 

[TwinArrowsFarm]

The main reason I decided to put it down was because of his rectum. It was getting worse.

 

[why do birds]

The main reason I decided to put it down was because of his rectum. It was getting worse.

You made the right decision. It sounded like if it would survive the leg issue, it would have that sticky butt problem. Both are bad! It feels terrible to lose one though. One of ours broke the shell and got stuck. We gave it too much time and it didn't make it and we were very sad to see it die like that. It would've been a white silkie too, so it was so sad. I really wanted 1 white bird too but it wasn't meant to be.
You are very brave! It takes a lot of courage to end an animals suffering, but it's the right thing to do!

 

[TwinArrowsFarm]

@why do birds Thank you
My husband was gone for the day so I really had to woman up.
It look me about 20 minutes to psych myself up but once the dead was done (and I spent a few minutes balling) I felt a lot better knowing he wasn't suffering anymore. I will try silkies again once I do some adjusting to my incubator or buy a new one.
Your Fredo is very cute by the way!

 

[KV Silkies]

@why do birds Thank you

My husband was gone for the day so I really had to woman up.
It look me about 20 minutes to psych myself up but once the dead was done (and I spent a few minutes balling) I felt a lot better knowing he wasn't suffering anymore. I will try silkies again once I do some adjusting to my incubator or buy a new one.
Your Fredo is very cute by the way!

that seems to be the way it usually works, when the hubbies are gone, altho mine has already told me i'm on my own, he is the more softie of the two of us and wouldn't be able to put one down if it needed to be. twinarrows, you got through this, you can do anything incubating!

 

[KV Silkies]

whydobirds, your fredo is super cute!

I candled my blood ring at lunch quick in the closet, I am still so on the fence. I grabbed the wrong egg first since I haven't taken anyone out yet but a couple that were totally clear, and I am looking at this egg and think I saw a little dot moving around in there... sooo darn tough to see! but I about had a spazz attack that MAYBE I have 2 eggs growing! altho it looks so different than my egg that is on track, wondering if it's develooping late? no clue what else that little moving dot would have been tho!