Sorry it has taken so long to get back to you. Have you talked to that
Tractor Supply to see if anyone else has reported similar problems? I really don’t think it likely for the chicks to be diseased from
Tractor Supply, but anything is possible. It’s best to start by eliminating the obvious.
Off the top of my head I can’t think of any diseases that acts like this. I really don’t think that is the problem. To me it sounds more like poisoning. My first thought is your feed moldy. Is the feed damp? Damp feed can turn moldy, which can harm the chicks. Some people wet the feed, which is fine, but it needs to be cleaned out regularly and replaced so it doesn’t turn moldy. Are you fermenting the feed? Some people have posted where the fermenting process went wrong and they lost chickens because of it.
Are you adding anything to the water? Many people on here regularly add all kinds of weird things to the water in an effort to “help” the chicks. That’s generally not a problem and may even help the chicks but not if you get the proportions wrong. Too much of a good thing is often not a good thing. Personally I just make sure they have a constant supply of clean fresh water with no additives.
What kind of bedding are you using? Pine or aspen shavings are fine but cedar shavings give off fumes that can harm the chicks if they are concentrated. If it is cedar you should be able to smell it. The shavings in that photo do not look like cedar.
Is the bedding dry? Wet bedding can become moldy over time. Mold can possibly be harmful.
Do the dead ones have swollen crops? In some ways this is consistent with a blocked crop. Sometimes chickens eat things that block the exit to the crop. They may eat long things that twist and tangle into a ball too big to exit the crop and get to the gizzard where it would be ground up. If they don’t have grit to help grind it up, it can cause a blockage at the exit to the gizzard if it makes it that far. It’s also possible they can eat enough sand or grit to cause problems in the crop, it just gets full and doesn’t empty. If the crop gets impacted, it often smells sour.
An impacted crop really does not happen often, but it’s possible the chicks are eating enough wood shavings to cause a blockage. Are you feeding them anything other than chicken feed that may get tangled in the crop and needs to be ground up in the gizzard? If you are, they need some grit to prevent a blockage in the gizzard. Some people cover the shavings with paper towels for two or three days to keep the chicks from eating the wood shavings before they learn that their feed is what they should be eating. A lot of people do not use paper towels or anything to cover the shavings and don’t have this problem, but it is a possibility.
Can you think of anything you’ve done that could cause fumes, maybe a cleaner that didn’t get rinsed out enough? It looks like the brooder had good ventilation so fumes should not be building up in it.
Has anyone, say your kids, fed the chicks anything “different”? I can’t remember what it was but I remember a post on here where kids had given the chicks something they should not have and it killed the chicks. I think it was a feed meant for other types of pets.
I’m out of ideas. Some of these are grasping at straws but I really can’t tell for sure what is going on. I wish you luck!
