Mamas weaning early?

[MamaDani]

We have 3 litters in our colony. Once the babies started coming out of the nest boxes I sectioned off an area in the run so that the chickens couldn't get to the babies while they learned to hop around. We found a baby that had been trampled on Sat. I assumed that they didn't have enough room and let everyone have access to the whole run (the babies are getting around very well now). Yesterday I found 2 more that looked to have been trampled. So I moved the babies into their own area. I gave the mamas supervised time with the babies last night and today and none of the mamas are letting the babies nurse. The babies however seem to have no problem eating the pellets and drinking water. When I put a couple of dishes of pellets in the nursery run this afternoon they attacked it! Could the mamas be weaning the babies? 2 litters are 4 weeks and the other is 3.5 weeks. It just seems too early but I am still pretty new to this.

 

[MamaSheepdog]

How sad that some of them got trampled! I'm so sorry!

If you have a buck living with the does, they are probably already bred and about to have their next litters. The bucks will sometimes try to mount the does while they are kindling, and certainly will breed them in the first day or two after kindling.

If that is the case, then the does would certainly be weaning the kits. Even if they aren't pregnant, many does will stop feeding at that age anyway. In a wild (or colony) setting back to back pregnancies are perfectly normal.

 

[Bad Habit]

I wean at 4 weeks myself. My polish litter is 2 days shy of 4wks, and when I had momma out for some run around today, I noticed she had no milk left. I think it's natural for the does to wean this early.

I'm not sure, however, that it is normal for does to trample their kits during weaning, I'm sure someone will pipe up about that!

 

[MamaDani]

I was shocked to see trampled babies. The first one kind of makes sense since they were in a small area but the other two have me stumped. The bucks have their own separate cages since they can't get along.

 

[MamaSheepdog]

If the bucks are separate, and the does are not bred, maybe one is chasing and mounting the others in her frustration and the kits got trampled in the melee. I would get the does bred back.

 

[3mina]

I don't do colony but my does wean at about 4 weeks

 

[MamaDani]

*Update*
I eventually got a clear sign the mamas were weaning the babies; they started snapping and swatting at the babies when they tried to nurse. :lol: I'm also not 100% positive anymore that the babies were trampled to death. I'm thinking that they could have been trampled after they died. We had another baby die after the babies were in a separate area...so trampling wasn't possible. I did some searching here and weaning enteritis came up. I changed the babies' diets to mostly oats and hay. And (knock on wood) we haven't lost another baby...even with this crazy cold snap we're in the middle of. Now to figure out when I want to breed the does again...