WEEDS!!!!!! Silkie just choked to death!

[2manyhats]

Same here, thanks. I never thought about weeds as a choking hazard (nor grapes for that matter).

 

[the simple life]

I am really sorry this happend to you, I am sure everyone appreciates that warning.
I would also just like to take a minute to let anyone with new chicks know that I almost had a 2 day old chick die from choking on the feed.
I bought the purina start and grown chick feed.
Its definitely chick feed but they make the crumbles so big that the babies can't eat it.
The first time I noticed it was with a different group of chicks, they were taking the food out and dropping it and and desperately looking for more, I realized they weren't eating it but seemed to be starving.
I put a bunch in my mixer and ground it up and they went hog wild eating it.
So I keep a big container of it ground up and ready to go now for the babies.
The other day my new 2 day old chicks arrived in the mail, I put out the food and a short time later I noticed one of the babies was opening and closing its mouth and shaking, I thought it was having some kind of a seizure.
I grabbed it and looked in its mouth and sure enough a big piece of the food was stuck in its throat.
I must have missed a piece of the food and it didn't get ground up.
I had to use tweezers and pull it out of its mouth and then there was more in its throat that I kind of just scraped out.
He was fine after that but it scared the daylights out of me.
I have waited a long time for these little ones and I almost blew it.
If I hadn't been hanging around the brooder watching them I would have lost him for sure.
I posted about it the other day and a few people said they are having the same problem wth the starter food being too big for them to eat and it needs to be ground up first.

 

[donnap1967]

I had to do the same thing with the starter crumbles. My chicks were pecking at the crumbles, and doing the pick up and put down thing same as yours. After I put them in the blender for a few turns they ate happily. Of course, you don't want a fine powder either so a few turns in the blender was perfect.