Something is wrong with my chick

[Broody Bist]

Guys something is definitely wrong with one of my 6-day-old babies. Please read this all the way through, and anyone who has experienced this with their chicks or knows maybe what's wrong, please reply ASAP.

So, when we got our chicks, the two D'uccles were a little messy. A simple case of pasty butt, which we have had before in the past, so we do know what we're doing with this. Jacqueline had to go through one cleaning, then she was great. But Marguerite (the chick in question) had to be cleaned over and over and over.

Now what started as a little case of pasty butt has escalated. She has a very swollen vent, and every time she squats to poop (if you've had chicks, you know the 'pose' I'm talking about) she just stays like that and makes a loud peeping noise over and over. It's almost like she's constipated. Or have you ever seen a hen having trouble laying an egg? That's kind of what it reminded me of. I had a modern game bantam who would have trouble laying, and she did EXACTLY the same thing, same noise and everything, except she was trying to lay an egg and not poop.

Marguerite is kind of slow and wobbly on her feet too, for a chick that's almost a week old. I see her eat and drink all the time, and there is plenty of heat (also a place to escape the heat). Their food and water is always clean, and we're doing all we can for her. Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong??

I know, that's a lot to read, but if you read this far and you know what might be going on, please help. Suggestions are welcome. Actually anything is, I'm pretty desperate.


~Elisabeth

 

[Broody Bist]

UPDATE: We went ahead with our cleaning routine like we usually do (cleaning off the poop with a paper towel and warm water, then drying with the hair dryer on low) but we decided to try lubricating it more, like @micstrachan suggested, only we used vaseline (it's perfectly safe for chicks, we used it to help poop slide off when our earlier batches had pasty butt). We also gently massaged the area around her vent and stomach like @Cayuga momma suggested. So far, it seems to be really helping! She is pooping a lot easier and more often, even though she does make that terrible sound and squat there for a while. We are going to get some solid coconut oil later on and see how that goes. So far so good!!

 

[azygous]

She has all of the classic symptoms of constipation. It often accompanies pasty butt. She needs unstopping. Coconut oil in its solid form is easiest to stuff small pieces into her beak. Try to get a half teaspoon of oil into her.

If you have no coconut oil, use olive oil or mineral oil.

 

[micstrachan]

Hello. What bedding do you have? She might be eating the bedding and getting backed up from it. Do you have coconut oil on hand? You can lubricate her vent with it, but you can also feed her tiny chunks of the solid oil to help her break up the mass. Just put little bits in her beak so she can swallow them on her own one at a time. I’ll be here if you can reply right away.

 

[Cayuga momma]

So I'm not sure exactly what could be wrong with her, but cleaning out her vent could help. Use an oral syringe filled with saline solution to gently squirt into her vent. Massage the area around the cloaca. If she is constipated, this should help work out hard poop. Once the cloaca is clean, follow up with betadine or iodine-based antiseptic. Adding Apple Cider Vinegar with "Mother" to their water will help.

I had ducklings with severe pasty butt die from the poop stuck inside creating an infection.

You don't have to be doing anything wrong for things like this to happen. This chick could just get easily stressed which would make her more susceptible to problems. She could also have what they call "failure to thrive".

Please don't blame yourself!
I hope she pulls through!

 

[Cayuga momma]

 

[Fishkeeper]

"Failure to thrive" isn't one disease or malformation, it's an umbrella term for a baby that didn't quite develop right in some way that isn't immediately lethal but won't allow for long-term success. It happens to all animals, including humans.

 

[Broody Bist]

You could mix her feed with coconut oil.
If you are noticing a big difference between her and the other chicks she may have hatched out with internal problems...something you can not "fix."

Did these chicks come from your own flocks eggs?

No, we got them from a local feed store. It's the same store we have bought all of our chickens from, and they've always been beautiful and healthy. Never had anything like this before.

 

[azygous]

It's critical to get the oil into this chick somehow. It can die from constipation, besides being a painful condition. If you grasp the chick from behind the head and force the beak open with your thumb and first finger, you can then slip tiny bits of the oil onto the tongue. It will automatically swallow. Take your time, and don't be in a hurry. Just be sure to get a half teaspoon down the throat.

For a nutrient boost and to get a FTT chick jump started, Poultry Nutri-drench is really the best thing to use as it's formulated to be absorbed directly into the blood stream, by-passing an immature liver. It can make all the difference in whether or not a chick survives being failure-to-thrive.

 

[Broody Bist]

Alrighty, time for the big fat UPDATE!!

Just to be clear, this is for anyone in the future that happens to be browsing BYC with this same problem. As a beginner, I would read threads like this and wish someone had come back with an update. So here it is!!


First of all, Marguerite turned out not to be a Marguerite!! “Her” name is now Dude, and he is living happy and healthy outside with Jaqueline.

We kept feeding him small amounts of coconut oil mixed with food everyday when he was a chick, he usually wouldn’t eat very much but we kept trying. We also would clean the poo off of him and, after drying his feathers, we put Vaseline on his vent and the feathers around it.

Soon, when it was time for them to move outside, we couldn’t keep bringing him in and cleaning him so we had to just put him out there and hope for the best.

He is still alive and well today and the spunkiest little roo I’ve ever had

Hope this thread has helped someone out there!!

Dude, 2019


Thanks for all of you that helped