baby chick help?

Question

we have a baby chick [5days old] when it hatched it was thrown out of its nest and left in the cold for approx 2 hours. we brought it home and nursed it back to good health. the problem is, all the other chicks that hatched at the same time are full of life but this one just stands and wont move. it can walk and chirp but just wants to stay with its mum. when we feed them the mum runs to the food and calls the chicks over but this one just walks to its mum and sits back under her again.its hardly eating. could it have brain damage from being in the cold for so long? is there anything we can do?
ive searched the net but cant find anything on this.

Answer 1

If she abandoned the chick in the first place, it's because there was something wrong with it. Sometimes chicks can get sick while still in the shell when bacteria invades the egg.

The chick may be sick. If it has watery feces, that's a sign that it needs some treatment. I always guess salmonella first, as that's the most common and likely illness for birds.

With a four day course of antibiotics, the chick could be just fine. But, as it's so small, I'd worry a little about how the antibiotics would affect it's system.

I own a duck farm, and we treat our own animals when it's something simple like salmonella. But then, we can generally tell what's wrong by observation... which I can't do for your bird. A chick with salmonella can survive. But, usually, within a couple of weeks it will lose it's sense of balance, and it's neck will wobble. By then it's too late.

You could take the bird to a vet, and they can diagnose and treat it... you could do a round of tetramyacin, which is good for MANY bird diseases (all the really fatal ones), supplemented with some kaolin (it's bird peptobismol, and you can use pepto bismol mixed with water without hurting the bird any). Tetramyacin is an over the counter antibiotic that you get at farm supply stores.

It all depends, is it Your bird, or a wild bird? If it's yours, treat it or take it to a vet. If it's sick the feces can spread the illness to other birds. If it's wild... best leave it be.

Answer 2

Insulation for the first couple of hours following the cold is desired so to heat up it goes to its parent. If you picked up the baby chick then the smells, chemicals from your skin could be dropped on its fur/skin and the parents will think differently of it, such as an outcast. Over some time it should be fine again but the first couple of days I suspect it will remain like that. Hypothermia is not probable in 2 hours for a well insulated chick, and also it cannot cause brain damage, only fright temporarily.
Good Luck ;)

Answer 3

it probably was thrown from the nest by its mother,they do this to the runts of the nest