Gasping chick... Solution found!

[BantamBabesFarm]

Hello everyone.


I bought six OEGB chicks from TSC on Thursday afternoon. The tiniest one in the clutch was gasping... every single breath, gasping. Although it was still eating and drinking and pooping.

I was very worried and came here to read all I could on "Gasping Chick". I searched for it in this forum. I read all of them. I was saddend to know that most have not made it.

But I didn't give up... and what worked for mine, I hope will work for yours too.

All I did was add sugar to the water. The next day... No more gasping! He still breathes just a little bit different from the others, but the gasping has totally stoped.

So please. If you need something to do that might help your gasping chick, try the sugar water. I put it in with them all and so they all got it, healthy or not. They all seem more happy and spritely now and even the little one is doing great.


Good luck!

 

[BuffOrpington88]

That's great! Good idea! Sugar water helps to give them energy, so maybe that helped.
Good job!

 

[alk678]

Thanks for your information. We bought chicks from TSC, and they arrived last Friday (This is Sunday). There are 4 breeds which we put in two tubs with food and water with electrolytes in it. One of the Hamburgs arrived dead and 4 have begun gasping. I was afraid it was coccidiosis even though they are so young, but since yogurt has worked miracles in outbreaks before, I gave them some. It seemed to give them a little strength, but they continued the gasping motion. One died. Then I found your information about the sugar water, and we gave it to the remaining three. One has died, one is gasping, but not as badly, and the other one seems to be sleeping comfortably right now. It seems very noteworthy that all of the gasping chicks have been of the same breed, Hamburgs. None of the other breeds has shown this symptom. Were your chicks all of one breed? Also, did you have electrolytes in the water the chicks were drinking? The package we have says to provide water with electrolytes and plain water separately. Is it possible that this is toxicity? Also, our chicks were shipped in rather cool temperatures. Is this possibly due to temperatures? I would appreciate any ideas that anyone has.

 

[simonerol]

My chick just died gasping, there are probably different reasons why, I always start them of with sugar water and pro biotics, it only took a short time, I may have not checked on them for less then 3 hours

 

[casportpony]

My chick just died gasping, there are probably different reasons why, I always start them of with sugar water and pro biotics, it only took a short time, I may have not checked on them for less then 3 hours

Sorry for your loss... Gasping, or mouth breathing, is often a sign that the dying process has started, it's usually followed by what look like seizures.

 

[simonerol]

What causes it?

 

[casportpony]

​

What causes it?

I'm not sure, but it is something that I have seen chickens, turkeys, peafowl, cats and horses do shortly before death. I did a google search for "dying symptoms" before and it was explained there... Quite disturbing.

 

[emfroth]

So sorry that the sugar water didn't work with the one chick.

Ours went through the same thing, but we didn't use sugar water alone and that seems to have helped. Not sure if it's gape worms or coccidiosis or something else, but if anyone is still reading this or going through it, you might try what we did:

We made sure our sick chick was extra warm, than gave her the following mixture:

A small clove of garlic, crushed and placed in
About a 1/2 c of water
About a tsp of organic plain yogurt (below the cream layer--chickens are not great with milk products)
Almost a 1/4 cup of organic sugar

Obviously I'm not totally sure about those cup measurements, didn't actually measure. It tasted sweet and garlicky-- but not so garlicky that it burned, when I tasted it (at first it did, but I added a bit more water).

Used an eyedropper which I would press gently to the side of her beak and then barely squeeze-- she would swallow a bit, then rest. It took ages but I got a dropper-full in her, then let her sleep for a couple hours, then repeated. Did this 4-5 times the first day.

The second day, made up some without the yogurt (couldn't put it in the fridge between doses, because it was too cold for her, so omitted the yogurt just because I wasn't sure....)

Today is day #3, and she hasn't gasped at all today, but I put a clove of garlic in the water of all the chicks just to be on the safe side.

Got the garlic idea from a couple of books. It boosts their immune system, and the sulfur helps them get rid of gape worms (which lodge in their throats and basically suffocate them) Apparently gape worms don't like sulfur!

I've also ready that pumpkin seeds are a good natural de-wormer, but our little chick was way too sick to eat pumpkin seeds.

She's eating now, though, and drinking and sitting with her companions. Still seems weak, but we'll dose her again if she gets worse.

Hope this helps!

NOTE: Some books will say to steer clear of garlic because it will give eggs a garlicky taste. But if it's just non-egg-laying chicks we're talking about....no worries!

 

[casportpony]

@emfroth , you should learn how to tube feed, it's much easier than dropper feeding.

-Kathy

 

[Indyshent]

Sorry to be a thread necromancer, but I just tried it, and I think it was too little too late for this poor chick. She started gasping very suddenly, but had seemed really weak before. She was dead in less than half an hour.