It has been a BAD week for our meat chickens. We started with 16 chicks about 7 weeks ago. 2 died in the first couple of weeks. This week, 3 more died!!
We don't know what is going on. Perhaps they got too cold and that impacted them, but they are big and fully feathered. You'd think they'd be Ok. We've had the heat lamp on the last 2 nights, and another one died today.
The most intimidating prospect is that the illness that killed a bunch of our hens last fall and winter has transmitted to the meat chickens. They are not in the same coop, but they are using a water bucket that was used by the hens. One clear difference between the hens that died and the meat chickens that died is that the hens hung around looking morose and sick for a few days before dying, and the meat chickens are just dropping dead unexpectedly, with no obvious symptoms. Ok, there is one symptom. They are dead.
Given the rapid decrease of our flock, we are going to butcher all our chickens next week. And then Kevin is going to clean the coops very thoroughly as we have a new batch of 20 Golden Comets coming at the beginning of May. We do not want this mysterious illness to transmit through the new birds.
So, discouraging. Not huge in the grand scheme of things, but definitely discouraging.
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