Silkies tag-teaming the 2 batches of eggs.

[electrycmonk]

And now I'm holding my breath again for the last runt of the 2 batches......

'Flappy' just yesterday decided to go all broody and returned to the coop to pancake out and left the Chickie's in the crate by themselves.... But the little tykes been acting much slower the last 48hrs......

 

[electrycmonk]

This little runt seems stronger then the previous 4 that all sucomed to whatever caused them to die so quickly with the wry neck symptoms during the corid treatments.... Even the 1st to show blood in her poop survived without any signs of struggle. Unlike the other two hens that died during the 1st stage of the corid treatment.

This little tyke is still eating from the spoon and drinking from the eyedropper - when I hold it's head still. Otherwise it's a rythmic swaying back n forth of the head and neck....as it sits there with eyes closed.

 

[electrycmonk]

This was 2 nights ago.... The bowl is too tall. Live and learn. I have it on a saucer now.

 

[AllenK RGV]

I keep wanting to ask you if they were human incubated, but know the backstory. I have only seen wry neck in my incubated via machine silkies. The momma hatched ones not yet. Of course the majority the hawks took over winter anyhow. We have 7 new unwanted bitties now though, sneaky silkie broodies they are almost as prolific as roaches. Once they get to that critical mass you can no longer keep count of them you are going to get over run.

 

[electrycmonk]

And so I went in to feed & eyedropper the little tike..... Time ~midnight. It had rolled, partially into the scrambled egg w/yogurt when I walked in. I had a fresh batch of hydro-hen, Rooster booster and had the eyedropper loaded... Picked it up to set it back to it's feet. It was less rythmic. It was not as responsive. It shook off the drops that clung to the tip of it's beak 3+ times... Gave a honest real chirp and started to relax and began the open mouth slowed breathing the previous chickies would do and in less that 2 minutes it heart stopped and the breathing also stopped, while it was in my hand....... Dang it. This tyke sure seemed stronger as it was still stabilized when I had fed it about 8PM and checked to feel a nice sized crop them felt nearly full and 4-5 poop stains on the towels since bringing this one inside back around lunchtime. So this one only lasted just over 4 days with visible wry symptoms.....

Flappy is now fully in pancake mode, 4th day & 4th unfurtilized egg too.

I'm gonna try & go back to sleep now.

 

[electrycmonk]

10 days after the last runt passed away.
Now all 3 silkie hens are in full blown pancake mode & all squished together in the roosting area. They are all very tolerant of me gently lifting them up to check for eggs. They make that typical cranky squaking but, that is all.
At lunch time had the girls go check on the food & water levels and (grumbles) another chickie is now in a state of uncoordinated legs. Laying semi on its side.

They brought it inside for easier ability to care for it.... As it's now been over a week since finishing the 2nd 1/2 dose round of corid & no one had any signs of anything..... Grumbles now what.....
Sat small & shallow cups with food and water it leaned at about a 45° slant but, was easily able to eat the crumbles without aid. I finally scored a 4oz bottle of nutri-drench so mixed up a small bowl for eye dropper for this one.... It drank about 1/2 the sirynge... So in about 30 minutes I'll check on it again...

 

[electrycmonk]

Update and a sad theory to add.
That chick was doing stable until about 10PM then the symptoms increased and expanded. By saturday around lunchtime it was advanced to the level of keeping it's eyes closed ~90% of it's time until it pass away while asleep later Sunday morning.
The willingness to drink fluid by eyedropper is the same as almost all the other Chickie's.

I keep coming back to some genetic details I have read more then a couple times in threads here: the fragility of the cranial helmet. The reason of the semi-pointed peak of the helmet, the ridge of the skull. It dramatically increases the potential for brain damage. Well, this little one had a small blood scar that dried at the top center of the beak. And slowly developed the wry neck symptoms and then died in the same ~48hr time window as almost all the other chicks. The white Momma silkie was the much more harsh hen. I should of let Flappy take the first batch. She seemed to be much more gentle with her chickies. I won't make this mistake again. I should of paid closer attention to her "pecking order" with flappy & Tina. Yes, Flappy flipped the switch and went "pancake mode" with more gusto the the white hen and started to avoid her chicks but, she wasn't so harsh "in my memory" when she would peck at them while in 'pancake mode' in the roost.
So now the little one is now dead as of about 9PM tonight and yet another of the Chickie's was showing an awkward balance issue about lunchtime today. So it was brought inside at l,inch and has been fed and watered like all previous attempts and if the scientific method is leaned upon here tonight then before lunch tomorrow it will shift to the laying on its side and by Tuesday night it too shall pass in its sleep.

Occam's Razor is where I'm at now.

Good night.

 

[electrycmonk]

Occam's Razor ruled the week. That little tike also walked the same path as the previous ones. In nearly identical time line. It pass away in the night before we got up Wednesday morning.

Well, as a count the living, all the white Chickie's are no longer with us. Only the Brown egg, the chocolate & all three salt-n-pepper silkies are with us. All 3 Momma's are in full pancake mode still. The white one is starting to venture out and about as of yesterday so.... Maybe, maybe she's coming out of it.

I shall try to post pics of the remaining chicks so we can guestimate the sex of them as we are now 12+ weeks into this experience. As a side note, the 3 salt-n-pepa's have different quantities of "brown" in their wing plumage. 1 has nearly a sprinkling, 2) has a dash, & 3) has about 30% "brown" in wing feathers this weekend.

 

[AllenK RGV]

I do have to ask since you know how broody they get and you get a 50/50 sex split on average, what are your long term plans? Will you process them for cup'o'soup?

Also how many white cockerels/roos do you have? My sneaky egg thieving silkie broody is probably ready to set her tykes loose soon I am thinking I am going to put a bluetooth tracking collar on her this time. https://www.amazon.com/Esky-Wireless-Locator-Transmitter-Receivers/dp/B078XR8C15# this one is close to the price of a single Cube tracker but I can necklace 6 birds, who cares if they loose it as it seems to be and item designed to be found.

Cube makes a bluetooth one and you use it with their App, but what kind of data spillage will happen that way I prefer the rfid version.

 

[electrycmonk]

I do have to ask since you know how broody they get and you get a 50/50 sex split on average, what are your long term plans? Will you process them for cup'o'soup?

Also how many white cockerels/roos do you have? My sneaky egg thieving silkie broody is probably ready to set her tykes loose soon I am thinking I am going to put a bluetooth tracking collar on her this time. https://www.amazon.com/Esky-Wireless-Locator-Transmitter-Receivers/dp/B078XR8C15# this one is close to the price of a single Cube tracker but I can necklace 6 birds, who cares if they loose it as it seems to be and item designed to be found.

Cube makes a bluetooth one and you use it with their App, but what kind of data spillage will happen that way I prefer the rfid version.

My next post here will be an update on pics of each of the remaining chicks. I "just" took pics of each a few minutes ago specifically for this purpose.

As for the ones that died. Unfortunately for 3 reasons I just buried them. 1) our younger 3 daughters are now officially teens 13,13, &14. 2) my VA therapy has been paused and I'm not in the right frame of mind for the job of butcher.
3) every one that had died over night (accept one very tiny one) had cooled and rigermortis had set in.
Technically #4) I don't have space or tools procured yet for any of that yet as well.