Does anyone have a growth rate chart for chicks 4 months and younger? All I can find online is a graph for up to 10 months, making it very vague at the young age.

Also, what kind of losses would be average for fading chick syndrome?

Thanks

How much should my chicks weigh??

1 month 6.5 to 15 pounds
2 months 15 to 70 pounds
3 months 30 to 110 pounds
4 months 75 to 150 pounds
5 months 100 to 175 pounds
6 months 150 to 220 pounds
9 months 200 to 250 pounds
12 months 220 to 275 pounds
15 months 250 to 300 pounds


How tall should my chicks be??

1 month 12 to 20 inches
2 month 24 to 36 inches
3 months 30 to 48 inches
4 months 42 to 66 inches
5 months 50 to 72 inches
6 months 60 to 84 inches

The above numbers are benchmarks only but should give you some idea.
As for fading chick syndrome, I have several opinions.
First of all, they are not learning to eat young enough and basically starve when the yolk sac is gone. They are not getting enough exercise to use up the yolk sac, thus also being hungry and eating more. Third they could just be poor chicks because of poor nutrition of the breeders.

Thanks for the answer.

The chicks are African Blacks and almost 3 months old. Those heights are to the top of the body, not the head, correct?

These heights are at the top of the head, not the body.
Generally, African Blacks are a bit smaller in stature.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/30839116@N06/

These are my 3 month old African Blacks, purchased from former AOA member, Pat Naruz, on the day they hatched, June 24, 2008. The pictures were taken on September 23,2008. They are 4 feet tall or more. The birds were microchipped in a McDonald's parking lot off the interstate and Pat read the chips and has a copy of the microchip numbers. She was also kept informed of the progress, so this can all be verified.

The were fed a diet of alfalfa meal, beef heart (cheap meat), instant potato, and kelp for the first month. A daily head of cabbage was put in the pen.

The second month I added ground split peas to the mix.

At 2.5 months a free-choice feeder was added to the pen with foal food and dog food. This was in addition to the homemade blend.

I have just added ground corn and am reducing the potato,split peas, and beef heart.

It may be time to rethink if these babies are really obligate vegetarians. In mammals there are no vegetarian babies; milk is animal protein, liquid meat. They were fed about an ounce of meat per day, less in the beginning.

This was not a controlled study, nor was it intended to be. It was just a broad brush stroke to see if a diet without soy or carbs in the first month, but with meat protein instead, was going to accelerate or retard growth.

I have two more chicks hatched August 18. I picked them up on 9/10 and were only 2.5 pounds. Today, 9/25, they weighed 6.4 and 7.4 pounds, so they are gaining well, although I don't expect them to be as tall at three months because of their rough start. We'll see.

Thank you for your kind assistance.

Beautiful chick for sure.
The measurements given are benchmarks only. That means some do not make these numbers and others exceed them. I have rasied ostrich for 17 years or so and still do not think that your diet is necessarily the best, especially for development as a future breeder bird. That said, it is your birds and you can certainly feed it whatever you like.
Best of luck to you

Ostriches are omnivores. What are your specific objections, please?

First of all, I have never seen where scientist refer to ostrich as true omnivores. Yes they do occasionally eat an insect or two, but rarely.

Second of all, the AOA Certifed program as well as the USDA will not allow any animal for future human consumption to eat the meat or by-products of another animal - it is against the law. This of course came about with the mad cow disease. Although I certainly have never heard of any bird acquiring mad cow, it is thought that this was transfered via brain and internal organ meat.

For higher protein, we recommend Soy Bean, some folks will add Calf Manna.

Omnivore
I didn’t make this up, a google search produced these scientific organizations which labeled ostriches as omnivores:

http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/birds/ostrich.html

http://www.sandiegozoo.org/animalbytes/t-ostrich.html

I am very sorry to tell you this, but your advisers are totally wrong and need to read the actual regulations.

It is illegal to feed animal protein in ruminants ONLY.

Animal protein ban in Ruminants
http://aafco.org/Portals/0/Public/BSE_aafco_brochure.pdf

NPIP participation is voluntary and there are no legal restrictions on what we feed our birds.

So, the NPIP guidelines only apply to NPIP members.

The NPIP concern is not a variation of BSE, but bacterial contamination and cross infection from meat. That BSE argument, and I know where it came from, is spurious and without any scientific foundation.

Even for members of the NPIP, there are provisions to feed animal protein.
From NPIP:

Section F
(ii) All feed fed to the flock shall meet the following requirements:
(A) Pelletized feed shall contain either no animal protein or only animal protein products produced under the Animal Protein Products Industry (APPI) Salmonella Education/Reduction Program. The protein products must have a minimum moisture content of 14.5 percent and must have been heated throughout to a minimum temperature of 190 °F, or above, or to a minimum temperature of 165 °F for at least 20 minutes, or to a minimum temperature of 184 °F under 70 lbs. pressure during the manufacturing process.

(B) Mash feed may contain no animal protein other than an APPI animal protein product supplement manufactured in pellet form and crumbled: Provided, That mash feed may contain nonpelleted APPI animal protein product supplements if the finished feed is treated with a salmonella control product approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

There is a lot of misinformation on ratites out there. My copy of Avian Medicine, has page after page of the ratite chapter crossed out with a felt marker. Probably the only thing I didn't mark up was the section on transportation.

Way back when, it was extrapolated from other production animal diets what would grow ratite babies. The study that sticks in my head most, and I am going from memory, I packed all those old documents away long ago, showed that 16-18% protein produced the best growth and the lowest incidence of leg problems.

The problem with this study is that the researcher over-ran her data. The conclusion failed to take into account that the protein source itself could have been part of the problem, and not the level of protein. The protein source was soy.

So, the correct conclusion might have been that increasing levels of soy protein increased incidences of leg problems.

Soy has the potential to cause a lot of problem in the chicks.

Soy is under increasing scientific scrutiny


For an example scientific review on the dangers in soy I recommend:
http://www.thewholesoystory.com/index.php
http://www.westonaprice.org/soy/index.html

http://www.soyonlineservice.co.nz/
http://www.soyonlineservice.co.nz/01introduction.htm

An extract from the above page:
The use of new generation bird feeds that contained soy coincided with thousands of bird deaths and disorders. These effects were widespread and were reported by many of New Zealand's leading parrot breeders.
Among the effects seen by these bird breeders were:
beak and bone deformities
goitre.
immune system disorders
infertility-END EXCERPT

Soy and lack of animal protein may be preventing the chicks from growing as rapidly as they could. It has never been examined to see if soy is a nutritional food source or a source of stunting.

I have two more young chicks from Pat, so we will see how they do. I will report on the progress of the older ones on October 24, their 4 month birthday.

At 13 weeks one is over 5 feet tall and the little one is 4 feet 6 inches.

How much food (in pounds) will a chick consume? I've been told to plan for 50lb per month for 7 months...

Obviously the chart is attached.
You must get the babies eating as soon as possible (in my opinion). They eat very little at first, but they will learn to peck quickly. I like to throw in clover and they love it. I put feed on a towel rather than bowels at first because they will eat off the "floor" better than bowls. Once they begin knowing what food it, the bowls work just fine. You can get a chick starter for ostrich specifically or use any of the following or combination of the following to get then starter: chicken, turkey or game bird starter granules, hen scratch, alfalfa pellets and a bit of grit. As they are eating after about 3-4 weeks wein them off to the ostrich feed.
I pick up my chicks in the evening to see if their belly is full. If they get lighter and lighter, you have a problem.

Good luck