Today's Poses from Russian Orloff Chicks

I believe that the chicks were born around the 29th of April and, at about four weeks old.  As you can tell, they are in various sizes for all being about the same age. Some have wild new feathers that just seem to curl and stray. Each chick gave me a "nice" pose and I apologize for my poor quality of images.  I don't have a great camera and it's hard for me and the chick to both "hold still."  First was Blue, then Red. Next was Green, then Orange, who peeped loudly and proudly when she left me a warm gift.  Blue is the friendliest and easiest to hold/handle and therefore, the most photos. You can see their *food* coloring dot in some of the photos.  Some of them are changing from cute peeps into scraggly adolescents. Also, I just want to let you know, I did not "bend" any feathers to highlight them... and yes, Green's feathers just "do" what they do.  (Click on the photos to see them enlarged.)

Blue Peep
Red Peep
Green Peep
Orange Peep

Thanks for taking the time to peruse the pix. 

Four Weeks and Four Long Necks

We officially have four long necks now.  The largest, Blue, has some really interesting feathers coming in, with visible quills and everything. The smallest, Orange, is just starting to stand up more "upright" and has started to stretch out her neck, but, being the smallest, she is less "assured and assertive" so she seems to be more prone to staying compact in size. 

We are still working with Red to get her more tame and less flighty.  She was finally willing to peck at my fingers a little today while I fed them some hard-boiled yokes, but that only came near the end of the feeding. She was very leery of my hand anywhere near her without the food.  The others are significantly more comfortable with being held.

I've been reading more about Russian Orloff chicks and some individuals seem to believe that since they were on the endangered list for so long that the breed has lost some of its purity and resiliency, hence, the  stock from some of the breeding/hatcheries may not be quite as strong or quality as the more traditional breeds in the US.  I suppose that might explain why we have lost the number of chicks with this batch. I may want to talk with some of the breeders on the west coast to the north of us since there appear to be several farms breeding the Orloffs in the Pacific Northwest.

And Now There Are Four

Unfortunately, Purple did not make it through the night.  She was the only baby chick that was sneezing non-stop. She would shake her head with each sneeze and she had like a gurgly-burbly sound when she breathed. Her eyes looked clear and she didn't have any type of discharge from either her eyes, nostrils or beak.  She didn't have diarrhea, either. She ate well, but she was puny and did not appear to be growing much. The only real symptoms, aside from not growing, is that she was sneezing a lot; like every minute or two. So Purple is the third chick we have lost in as many weeks. I really have to wonder how on earth other people are able to not lose any baby chicks while we have lost almost 50% of ours?!  Orange is the other weak one who seems to have poor eyesight. I guess we will just have to wait to see what happens with her.  

As a special treat today, we dug up a couple of worms and chopped them up for the chicks.  They loved them and it turned into a chase between the chicks to try to get the dangling piece of worm from the mouths of the others after all the worm bits were gone from the tray. 

Heading into Week Four

The three long necks appear to be doing fine.  The two little ones, Purple sneezes a lot with a raspy chirp, and Orange (aka little peep) has a very loud piercing chirp but I think she is near sighted.  I swear, she either has really bad aim or she cannot see clearly. She typically pecks where there is nothing to eat!!! I think she would benefit from some little chicken eyeglasses.  These are the two who seem to be picked on most and pushed out of the way. In an effort to help them as well as to get them accustomed to being held, I have been feeding them separately with some egg yoke while sitting on my lap.  

Since the weather is starting to warm up a little, I have added DE (diatomaceous earth) to their food (a small sprinkle) as well as a light dusting to their shavings.  The only bad thing with this is the Poof Effect every time they jump or move suddenly since the stuff is easily "disturbed." Aside from that, that's about all that's news today.

Two Long Necks

One of the "new" baby chicks has developed "long neck."  At least, that's what I call it.  The chicks seem to get really long necks, almost over night, and when that happens, they try to take flight more readily. Since it appears that they all are going to be "long necks" by the end of the week, I decided to color the three newbies and recolor the two originals. Blue and Green have been "refreshed" with a dot of food coloring.  The new long neck is Red. The littlest peep is now Orange and the third is Purple.  I can certainly tell the difference between the originals in handling, as well.  The originals are easier to pickup and they tend to stay close by when I reach my hand into the brooder.  The other three tend to scatter in all directions.  It may take another week or two for them to gain trust of me.

I wanted to add a note about how adorable it is to watch baby chicks drink water. After they dip their cute little beaks into the water, they then lean back and tip their little beaks toward the sky to swallow. Here are some cuties demonstrating the technique. They are not mine. I found the pix online.

Update 5/24 morning - Green has become the third long neck. 

Three Weeks and Counting

These are pix of the Spangled Russian Orloffs at three weeks of age.  Blue is the largest (in one of the photos, you can see the fading blue on the breast). The smallest just started to get her tail feathers. While Blue is almost twice the size of the littlest peep, they are the same age. Blue has longer tail feathers and a more expansive wing spread. S/he also is losing the chipmunk coloring on her back (more like covering it with her wings) while her wing coloring is becoming quite beautiful.  Click on the photos to enlarge them.

Three weeks - Spangled Orloff - tallest & smallest

Little Peep's brand new tail feathers

This is the one that wouldn't stop eating shavings.

Blue's Prep for Flight

Built a Bigger Brooder

This week, I built a bigger brooder for the quickly growing chicks.  I considered taping together two cardboard boxes, but was concerned that the boxes would not be sturdy enough.  I decided to pick up some inexpensive foam boards like these... Readi-Board from the local dollar store. I made it 30"(w) x 40"(l) x 20"(h) with five of the 30" x 20" sturdy poster boards by cutting one of the boards into thirds and taping two of the extra pieces to extend the sides for a rectangle. I could have just taped two more of the boards across the bottom with duct tape, but decided a tray would be more useful and help to strengthen the walls of the box. Between the roll of duct tape and the boards, I spent about $13.00 on supplies to build the new brooder. This is half the price of the cardboard and plastic brooders that I have seen, with approximately the same floor space, a bit more sturdy than standard cardboard, and easier to clean than the cardboard boxes taped together.  

With 30" by 40", I now have at least 8 square feet of floor space for the five chicks.  This also provides more cool space away from the heat lamped area. The top is covered with  a metal screen next to a plastic baby gate to ensure that Blue does not fly out.  S/he is growing the fastest, and has figured out how to use her/his wings to get across the brooder quickly!

More Chick Chickens

More chick chicks here and more chick chicks there. We picked up three more chicks. These were from the same batch that we had picked up the first chicks from. Obviously, they were the same age and size.  They are starting to get little tail feathers. However, one of the three new chicks seemed to start getting lethargic within hours after we put the three of them into the brooder.  I also noted early on that this one seemed to love eating the shavings and totally ignoring the feed.

So, I started thinking about the environment that they came from had a screen flooring, and no shavings. I wondered if this was causing her to be confused. I noted that by the evening, the other chicks would step on her and she wouldn't even bother to get up. She would look up momentarily, then lay her head right back down.

This time, I isolated her in a small wire cage with no shavings, but did fold up some paper towels on the base of the cage. (This is a cage that I purchased for the guinea pigs as a just in case I need to take one to the vet. It is easy to clean out and sterilize.)  I added little water and food containers in the cage. Also, I covered up just the top of the little cage (but not the sides) with a cloth so that the other chicks could not "mess" on her or her food. The cage was tall enough that she could stand up and walk around a bit if she decided she wanted to. I put this little cage next to the spot where all the other chicks liked to sleep. This ensured she stayed in a warm area, but still has air flow and the other chicks were nearby.  She was not getting pasty (yet) but she just did not seem interested in eating or drinking anything. I checked on her several times throughout the night, but still she seemed extremely listless.

The next morning, I let her out of the isolation cage since she was standing on her own, although she still did not seem interested in eating. Then, suddenly, mid-morning, she kicked into eating mode. While all the other chicks were napping, she dug into the food and water.  Soon, the others joined in, crowding around her, almost to the point of pushing her away from the food... but she fought back and squeezed back in to the tray.

Hence, at this point in time, we have five baby chicks and thankfully, no more pasty bottom. One of the suggestions made to me was to feed the chicks some mashed up egg yoke once a day until they are old enough to build up a healthy digestive tract. Also, be sure to include some pro-biotic and electrolytes in the water, plus keep the water in the coolest portion of the brooder.  Unfortunately, when I do this, the chicks seemingly forget to drink water.  Because of this, I have been moving the water around in the brooder until I have found a good region between the warmest area but before the chicks get to the food. That seems to be a decent trade off, for now, since they remember to drink throughout the day. I am changing the water out every other day with fresh (treated) water and cleaned trough. I have also added a sprinkle of grit to the food.  Since making these changes, we have not encountered any more pasty (pooh buildup) on any of them.

I think I have a better understanding now, after doing some more research.  One chicken breeder explained that baby chicks are born without any healthy bacteria in their digestive tracts. Chicks that are raised by their mommas simply don't develop the pasty pooh buildup problems (aka pasty butt). The author suggested that the chicks tend to eat their momma's pooh and ultimately end up getting the good bacteria from their momma that way. So, some of the suggestions to help build up the bacteria more quickly involved the pro-biotics in the water, a small amount of mashed up egg yokes of hard boiled eggs on a daily basis or a little bit of plain live culture yogurt. The articles pointed out that not all yogurt is the same. Yogurt with live cultures in it is not as tasty as the stuff with fruit and sweeteners that most of us like as a treat.  Just be alert to getting the yogurt from your dairy shelves that have the live cultures.

After learning that, I did boil some eggs and mashed up half of a yoke each afternoon for the past few days. So far, the chicks definitely seem to love the egg yokes to the point that it turns into a feeding frenzy as they scramble around each other to get the last little nibbles. Hopefully, this will do the trick and we will not lose any more baby chicks!

Feeling Blue Over Red

Another death, and feeling downhearted! For the past couple of days, we have been cleaning the pasty pooh off of Little Red.  This is caused from a variety of things, such as eating the shavings in the bedding, poor digestion, not drinking enough water, or generally being dehydrated. She definitely was not having the same issues as Yellow, but obviously something is amiss relative to digestion.  It gives me pause, wondering if the really hot spell that we had a week ago contributed to digestive issues.  We may have no choice but to go pick up some more chicks.  Thankfully, the weather predictions this next week and into the next are cool and rainy!!!  That means that our house will not be over heated into the extremes. But for now, I'm feeling a little blue that we lost another chick :(

Untrained in the Emergency Room

One of the chicks (Yellow) died this morning. The situation started last night. When I got home from work last night, my son was holding the chick and he told me that he found the chick stuck between the feeder and the waterer, convulsing. It was no longer showing any symptoms at that point.  I checked the standard concerns; there was no pasty bottom, it seemed to have the ability to drink water when I offered it to her, she wasn't limp or lifeless, she was able to stand on her own, etc. After holding her for about 15 minutes, I decided to put her back into the brooder with the others.  She quickly fell asleep and I assumed that she was okay.

About an hour later, my son got me again and showed me that she was in distress again.  What he thought was convulsions looked more like hiccups (kinda) to me. She would stretch out her neck, open her beak and sort of toss her head back over and over and over.  She was laying near the feeder but she definitely was not stuck this time. She was attempting to peep, but there was barely any sound coming out.

I wondered if she was chocking on the food. I tried to get her to drink some water this time but she wouldn't.  I cleaned out an eye dropper and tried to give her water this way, hoping to possibly wash down the food.  That was not helping. (Later I read that's never a good idea because the chick could end up with the water in her lungs and die by drowning.) I handed her off to my son, suggesting that he massage her neck in a downward (only) motion to hopefully encourage her to swallow the food and to keep trying to give her drinks of water. By this time, our local feed store was closed for the night, so calling them for suggestions wasn't an option.

I checked online for "thoughts" and suggestions.  I couldn't really find anything that might help her swallow, but I did read that she may be having crop issues, particularly if she was on medicated chick food (yes she was). The only suggestions that I could find at the time was to pick up some pro-biotics to add to the water and isolate her from the others, and not let her eat anything right away until the crop was clear.  There was a lot of talk about vets doing surgery on older chickens, but I seriously doubted that was an option for a week old chick. We set up a smaller aquarium right next to the large one, with water for her, and instead of shavings, we laid down some towels.  She was definitely not happy to be separated from the others and peeped loudly about it. As the night wore on, she would hardly drink anything and seemed to become more lethargic.

When we got up the next morning, she was basically lifeless and couldn't hold up her head. We got to the feed store just as they opened for the morning to pick up the pro-biotics and get unmedicated chick food, but I really did not think it was feasible for us to save her at this point. When we got back home, it was too late. My son dug a hole to bury her, and I left for work.   It's always a sad, empty feeling when these cute little fuzzy animals don't survive.  I don't know about others, but I feel so helpless and untrained in these types of moments.

We have switched the other chicks over to the non-medicated food, added pro-biotics to their water (at least for the week).  The others appear to be fine, and hopefully, this will be the only one that we lose.

Momma Hen's Day

Yesterday was Mother's Day and as of now, I'm starting to feel like Momma McHen. After a discussion with my daughter about trying to keep track of of the chicks' development, I decided to color code the four chicks with a dot of food coloring on each of their breasts; red, yellow, blue and green. We had decided to not name them, but at this point, the color is being used to identify each of them, as in, "Which one are you holding?" "Yellow."  I can basically guess which ones are yellow or blue, because they have more white in their new wings.  Green and red have a more mottled appearance in their wings.

Some of my g-kids came over to admire the new chicks on Mother's Day. Actually, the whole "group" came to cook me up a delicious barbeque dinner and have a slice of Mom's Day cake. That was nice and it was fun to watch the excitement in the eyes of the young ones as they hovered over the brooder.  There was no holding of the chicks while the kids were here so that there was no expectations by the kids that they would also get to hold them. The chicks were actually able to take their "usual" naps through the whole din of the family gathering. 

Speaking of naps, I didn't realize that baby chicks like to sleep "sprawled" on their tummies. When they first started doing this, I thought they were sick or something.  Their little necks are all stretched out and their wings poke out from their sides, and in some instances, they even stretch out their legs, like they're "planking" ;)  And they sure do sleep a lot.  Their little cycle is on hyper mode compared to human babies.  The process of eat, drink, poop and sleep seems to be completed in less than 10 minutes.  Another thing that I find interesting is that the chicks have absolutely no qualm in stepping on or standing on another chick who just so happens to be sleeping! Yeesh!

It's a Start

This is my diary of delving into the backyard chicken farm scene.  Luckily, I live outside of all city limits and live in "unincorporated" territory. On the not so great side is the fact that we have all sorts of wild creatures in addition to the typical stray dog and cat. We have fox, coyotes, deer, rabbits, gophers, raccoons, opossums, weasels, beavers, nutria, heron, owls and hawks (that I know of) that cross through our back yard. There have been instances of cougars, bobcats and black bears, but that is rare. But, I need to be more aware of the predators than the city folks do.

When I mention we, I mean my son, my husband and myself. We have all tried to contribute information that we read or have other knowledge about before making decisions as to what we collectively decide to do.

Prior to picking up the chicks, we purchased a small one-quart chick sized waterer, a small feeder, large bale of aspen shavings (we use that type already for the guinea pigs), some medicated chick food (25 lbs), some electrolytes with vitamins to add to the water, baby chick sized grit, a red 250-watt heat light and clamp on heat lamp with shield. Cut a small piece of two x four wood to put the mini waterer on to keep it up out of the shavings and less likely for the chicks to trample through the trough. I had an unused 30-gallon aquarium, so we filled the aquarium with a thin layer of shavings, put the feeder and water (with electrolytes) in the make-shift brooder, and rigged up a light stand for the heat lamp.  For now, with the small size of the chicks, we can get by with the three square foot floor space. The total cost for the items (not counting the aquarium) was about $50.00. I also had a thermometer that I placed in the bottom of the aquarium to help gauge the temperature.  We wanted to ensure that the temp was between 90F and 95F.

After a lot of research on breeds of chickens, we decided on trying the Russian Orloffs. One of the local farm stores gets this breed of chicks in on a regular basis, so we drove into town to pick up four one-week old baby chicks and brought them home in a little box. We were going to get three, but on the spur of the moment, my son and I decided we better get four since we had read that it is not uncommon to lose a small percentage of them to a variety of illnesses and/or deformities.

On the way home, with each bump in the road, the babies would loudly peep to express their dissatisfaction with my choice of routes or my driving skills.

One week Russian Orloff Chicks

We got them home, and safely deposited the four little chipmunk colored peeps into the warmed aquarium.  I introduced each chick to the waterer by gently dipping their beaks into the water and then setting them down next to the water. In no time, the little chicks, one by one, were drinking water, eating food and then quickly running back to the warmth of the light and huddling with the other three.

I put a screen cover over the aquarium with a weight to keep our pooch and fraulein feline out of the make-shift brooder.  Throughout the day and into the next, we adjusted the height of the lamp to strive for the ideal temp. Of course, we would encounter a heat wave on the first days, making it more difficult to keep the correct 90F temp.

Hi-tailing it back to safety!

As the chicks settled in, we started holding them on our laps and caressing them to get them accustomed to us holding them. I had a packet of small white towels used for washing the car. The towels are not all soft and fuzzy, but they are great as poop catchers while the chicks are being held, plus the chicks seem to like walking on them and pecking at them, I think because they are rough.  As soon as we were done holding the chicks, we would wash our hands because, as I mentioned earlier, there is always the chance the one or more of the chicks could have an illness, like Salmonella, and so we all are making a concerted effort to avoid accidentally contracting something that we would later dread having.