Wyandottes arrived today - Sleeping chicks?

[ARWyandott]

Ordered 5 Silver 5 Golden Laced Wyandottes pullets and 1 cockerel from Ideal Poultry. Received 15 total chicks!! 4 are "companion" cockerels for the journey, guess ill see what they are later.

a lot of the chicks appear to be dozing off with their heads and beaks on the floor. is this normal? some even do it directly under the light which im sure is 115 or more (150w bulb 25" up), cool side of box is 89.5 atm

nice to be here BYC thanks for havin me

 

[Wyandottes7]

They are probably pretty tired after being mailed to you. I know that when I got my chicks from McMurray Hatchery, they spent most of their first day home sleeping. Just make sure that they start drinking soon, and eating within the next two days. If they are still acting lethargic by tommorrow or so, try perking them up with some sugar water or some scrambled egg.

 

[Krazzy]

seems normal to me. mine seem to sleep, eat, run around and repeat. 115 seems kinda high temp? i thought the brooder should be 97 degrees?

 

[slagartist]

Even directly under the lamp, 115 from a 150w that's 25" off the ground is waaaay high, so unless you have a thermometer under it, I doubt it's that hot. I am using a 250w bulb that's about ~14" off the ground when they were a week old, with a thermometer directly under it, and I got about 95-100 directly beneath it.

Anyway, their first two-three days are the worrying days. You'll be up all night checking on them, it's normal. As far as sleeping... you need to look for more detail. Are ALL of them sleeping the same amount, or are 1-2 sleeping more than the others? Generally, at that age, when one decides she's hungry, suddenly they ALL decide they're hungry and it's a feeding frenzy. If you have one or two that sleep right through that, then maybe I'd be worried. But when they're all sleeping, also note: is this one breathing harder/softer than the others? (you can tell just by watching their backs rise) Ask yourself, when I put my hand in the cage and make some noise, do they ALL open their eyes and scatter, or do one or two open their eyes and then go back to sleep? Even picking them up (slow and careful!) helps, the two I had that didn't make it from shipping would show signs of life, but quickly go "back to sleep/comatose" shortly after being picked up, while the healthy ones would look at me like "What are you looking at, punk? Put me down this instant!"

Overall, your first week should be a lot like what Krazzy said: run around for 10-20min, fall over (in various, terrifying play-dead positions) and pass out, poop a bit, repeat. Just keep a close eye for chicks not doing what everyone else is doing. This young, I found lethargy the best way to single out a sick chick.

I hope your kids are just stressing you out for no reason! Be sure to post symptoms/pics if one is worrying you, people here are full of great advice!

 

[donrae]

You need to adjust your lamp so the cool end of the brooder is room temp. 90 degrees is too hot for the cool end. When a chick is raised by momma, they're either under momma, nice and toasty and a hundred or so degrees, or out in the world at whatever temp it is. They need to be able to get to an actual cooler area, it's not at all normal for their entire world to be 90degrees.

It's pretty normal for chicks to sleep a lot the first day or two, and falling asleep standing up balancing on the beak is a classic chick thing to do to freak the humans out

 

[ARWyandott]

Thanks everyone for the comments! I will make the adjustments when I get home today after work. The brooder is actually 2 cardboard boxes with a divider seperating the connecting tunnel hole i put in each box. Yesterday when cleaning the papertowels for the first time, i shooed them all into the second box which was 85 (garage room temp). They got very agitated, started pecking at each other. Everyone seemed to grow an attitude. After returning, they all had their fill of drink, food, them promptly passed out You're right, all they are doing now is sleeping, eating, drinking, pooping. Repeat all day..

To me it seemed when in the colder then normal area they were vocal, agitated, and aggressive towards one another, but back in the warm box they were sleepy and mild mannered.