Hand feeding help

[Malti]

So, this is the runt of the litter - out of 4. Siblings too big next to him so trying hand feeding - is he over 24hrs and its every 2hrs right?

[lovezebs]

Malti

Are parents feeding him at all?

If they are, then I would personally just supplement feed. This would be a lot easier than full time feeding, and parents and siblings would still be keeping him warm in the nest.

[Malti]

No he was on the floor if the cage, twice

[Sally]

If they are tossing him, then it may be time to hand feed. I personally do every 2 hours at the beginning, but I don't feed during the night. At this age, I will start feeding at 6am and stop at midnight. Once they start to feather out, I will start spreading out the time between feedings, first to 3 hours and then to 4 hours. Good luck with it, it is not an easy task.

I usually do three times a charm. In other words, I will put the baby back in the nest after the first and second times they are tossed, but the third time they are put in a brooder and hand fed. Of course, this is not hard and fast, as if I think the parents are harming the baby in the tossing, then I will act sooner.

[Malti]

I can do 7am till 4-5am... Is it bad if I feed during night once every 4 days? It's my night shift and can do that

[Sally]

Are you saying start feeding at 7am and then every two hours till 4-5 am? If that is the case, I would stop feeding at midnight or so, and start again in the morning. Working a night shift makes it much harder to hand feed, I've never had to do that, so I'm not sure how it will work. Sometimes, you just have to go with what works for you. I've seen on the forum where people can't take a bird to work, and so they feed before leaving home, then again when they get home (sometimes they can go home for a lunch break).

[Malti]

lost the little guy after 48hrs...his siblings are ok though

[debbie276]

So sorry

[Sally]

So sorry you lost him. You said that he was much smaller than the others, so it may be that he had something wrong with him.

[Rosa]

Unfortunate that you lost him hope his siblings are doing well.

[Jamm972]

Sally is it common for parents to toss out the weak or defective babies out of the nest? I do know sometimes this isn't accurate, it just might mean there wasn't room in the nest or they were positioned wrong.

On that note, do you think its possible the hen might know if an egg isn't fertile and will kick that out of the nest ?
I had 2 clutches so far from different pairs, 1 pair only kept 1 egg and it hatched yesterday so far the baby is alive and well, hope he makes it past the 4 day threshold after birth, but the other 3 eggs were found at bottom of cage and were pecked at.
in the other clutch this happened with 2 out of the 4 eggs.

[Sally]

I do believe that often when birds toss babies or eggs, they know something is not quite right. In the wild, it is survival of the fittest, and those babies that are weak often do not make it. When there is just one or maybe two babies, I think the parents don't want to waste the time on just one or two, so they will toss so they can start another, hopefully much larger clutch.

[Jamm972]

Sally the hen didn't toss the baby out yet, but I haven't seen her attempt to feed the chick. She is still sitting on it as well but not as long as I think she should. I'm keeping my fingers crossed, in hopes that it is just sleeping. I posted pics of the baby chick on one of the other topics. I was trying to track the daily growth process.