What am I doing wrong???? Very sad day :(

[Leavingegypt]

I have had 2 batches of chickens. 1 from TSC and another from a private breeder friend. My first flock, all have grown into healthy brids and are now starting to lay. My 2nd batch- 1 was dead when I went to pick them up, 2 had leg/foot issues, 1 got sick after 1 week and nearly died and another had a terrible crop problem that couldn't be resolved and had to be euthanized. What a difference- I treated them the same, same bedding, same temp, same feed~
The thing about chickies is that sometimes they get sick and sometimes they die for reasons in and beyond our control. It's hard because you bring them home and they are fuzzy and cute and get names and attention/love is poured out, But that's not always enough.
We are new to chicken-keeping as well, and early on we had to decide that even though we named these creatures and invested time in them- they were not pets like dogs and cats. They were livestock and we had to expect that things like hawks, weather and health issue would happen and chickens would die. We do the best we can, learn what we can and go from there. Hope everything goes better.

 

[Elanger]

Thanks for the encouragement everybody! Our last 2 chicks are still doing fantastic..they figured out how to jump out of the brooder, so on goes the cover We went by the place we got them today, and they gave us 5 new ones for free. This time we went with 6 week olds..they are already in the coop and loving all this new space they have!

 

[Birdgirl99]

Well that sounds great at least the others are OK here are my baby birds

 

[Birdgirl99]

The 2 on top are amercana pullets 4 weeks and one day today the others are black star pullets and are only 2 weeks old

 

[BGinVA]

We had a similar problem, bought 8, lost 3 over a couple of days period. I had wanted to avoid medicated food, but once I started the remainders on medicated I haven't lost any sense. Coincidence or did the medicated do something for the rest of the flock? I'll never know, but I won't be so quick to discard the thought of at least one bag of medicated when they are so tiny.

 

[Buckgawk]

no way of knowing for sure why they died but you should definitely have a thermometer in the brooder.. you could be cooking them and not even know it

 

[donrae]

I agree they were quite possibly too hot. At 2 or 3 weeks old, as warm as it is in most of the country, they need very little heat. And need to be able to spend MOST of the day out from under any heat source.

 

[Birdgirl99]

Yeah i'm in Florida and i gave them a heat lamp for about a week after that is was 95 degrees out so no more light i let them out in the half sun half shade in the day and put them on there porch at night