[Chickway]

Good Evening.  I am new to incubating chickens.  I have four chickens in my garden for 4 years now and really enjoyed it.  We lost two in that really cold weather at Christmas.  So decided I would take the leap into hatcig my own which I have always wanted to do.  I brought 6 Partridge Cochin eggs off ebay and 5 of them hatched yesterday.  They are all doing well apart from one that seems to have a problem with his balance.  He seems to topple over and then cannot get back.  He can go quite along time without doing this although wobbly on his feet.  He is interested in eating and drinking and doing poos.  I cannot see any obvious problems but he did take an awful long time to hatch and and when he eventually did it took him a while to loose the egg shell which seemed to follow him around. 

If any one has got any ifo to put my mind at rest that would be much appreciated.  Hes only 24 hours old.

Many thanks.

[hillfooter]

It maybe just exhausted from breaking out of the shell.  They can take a little time to find their feet.  Too early to worry yet.  They don't need anything to eat or drink for the first 36 hours but you can start to offer them some chick crumbs and a little water after 24hrs.  

Dip their beaks in the water and tap on the crumbs with your finger to imitate pecking and they'll get the idea.  Ensure that the water isn't too deep or there's a danger of drowning and also don't have any shiny or slippery surfaces for them to walk on or they can get splayed legs which can permanently injure them.  This is the danger with your unsteady chick.  If it's injured itself it might not recover.  I always use a plywood board with a fine mesh (5mm squares) stapled to it and spread chick crumbs on that until they learn to eat.  Then I use a purpose made chick feeder trough which has partitions so they can't scrat out the food or foul it. Also a gravity fed drinker with a very narrow rim trough will ensure they don't drowned.  Some people use a jam jar lid with marbles in it so they can't drowned but they walk on it a foul it so a proper chick drinker is best and will last them a few weeks until they can use a full sized one .

As they get bigger raise the feeder and drinker so the rim is just above vent height so they can't foul it.

I use shavings as a litter in the brooder and place the plywood feeder board on the shavings so that they don't trail shavings in the water or food.

You will need a heat source in the brooder but ensure they can move away from it so they don't get too hot.  Start off with the temp around 35deg C and slowly reduce it so by 4weeks it's at ambient.  If you have an IR lamp you do this by raising it over time.
HF

[Chickway]

Thank you Hillfooter,

I have put a towel in the brooder and they seem to have good grip.  What age do you put the shavigs down o the brooder floor. 

What does the drip feeder look like so I can look on internet for one.  I am using a tea saucer with the tea cup upside down on it at the moment.  Some have got the measure of it the others I am still coaxing with  cotton bud.  Slowly slowly I suppose.

I am hoping it is nothing serious with this little chick and that each day he will get stronger and stronger, he is eating well and will drink from the cotton bud but no quite got the hag of the main water supply but still working on it, its not cause he cant get to it its just he has not worked it out. 

Thank you for your advice any advice is greatly received.

Chickway

[hillfooter]

The drinker is just a smaller version of a full sized drinker.  I put the chicks straight onto shavings under a lamp in the brooder.  i wait untill half the brood is hatched and dry then transfer them. Then the remaining half.

Here's the incubator (a Brinsea Octagon 20DX) with chicks just about to be transfered to the brooder.  I should have removed that egg divider, must have been some reason I didn't which escapes me now!



Here's the plywood board with a mesh on so they don't slip



Here are some Vorwerks and Legbars you can see the drinker on the lhs



Here's the brooder which is in a stable outside.  I'm using Hemcore for litter here



HF

[Chickway]

Wow, What lovely pictures.  I have a drinker like that but thought it looked a bit big, will give it a go. 

I was up twice in the night to stand the chick back up and this morning he has learnt to drink the water supply rather than the cotton bud which is good. 

I have been reading various things on internet and am wondering if he has splay leg but just on one leg.  Would it be ok to tape his legs even though they are hairy (he is a cochin)?  I dont know why I call him a he as I am so hoping hes a girlie. 

How long do you keep your chicks in the incubator?

I have ordered some spray leg correctors from ebay but am wondering it might be better to tape rather than wait for the correctors to come through the post.

Many thanks.
Chickway x

[Casey76]

If it looks like he has splay leg I would go aahead and tape them.  Use tiny pieces of tissue on the piece of the plaster going round his legs so you don't pull the feathers out

If you catch it early enough you can correct a splay leg within two or three days - however I wouldn't breed from him/her in the future.

[Chickway]

Many thanks.  I will try it.  I am only hatchin for my own garden.  Just for pets and eggs.  Hopefully we can fix it as he seems happy in every other way eating and drinking.

Chickway.

[Chickway]

Hi. 
I just wanted to give an update on my little wobbly chick that Kept falling over and could not get back up without assistance.

I took him to the vets and he was not sure what was wrong with him and said that he was more positive cause the little chick was eating and drinking.  He did not think it was splay leg so we did not tape his legs.

I carried on getting up in the night to stand him back up and to make sure he had some water before retiring to bed.  Then on day 4 he did not fall over, I can not tell you how relieved I was.  I kept coming in and checking and he was still standing.  He is doing lovely now and I really cant tell him apart from the others. 

Just shows you should not give up to easy.  I am still in the very early stages of learning.  I do hope this one is a girlie as I think she might have to be a house chicken, ha ha only joking.

I have more chicks hatching on saturday, so hope I do not get to many other problems.  I need some sleep.

Chickway x

P.S. I tried to post some pictures but it came up that they were to large, any advice on how to post pictures?

[hillfooter]

They need to be below 128K file size.  Make the width about 640 pixels and reduce the quality to get the file size right or join photobucket and upload the photo to their web site then you can paste a link to the photo on their site to show the photo in reasonable quality and size without worrying about file size.
HF