We just brought home our first set of Buff Orphington chicks today and we are as panicky as the day we brought our newborn daughter home from the hospital!
Wondering if anyone might have any do's and don't's for the new featherless mommy caretaker? Also, any ideas on coops would be welcomed!
Peep Peep! (thanks) Whit
Posts: 34 | Location: Zn 8: South King Co, Western WA | Registered: May 07, 2008
I just want to congrats ya on your chicks. I think Buffs are a excellent choice and I recommend them to anyone, actually one of my Buffs is setting right now. best of luck with your flock
Posts: 55 | Location: Versailles, MO | Registered: December 04, 2007
Are they just day old chicks? If so, they will need to have a warm place. They have just came out of an incubator at 100° F. The easiest way to do this is to get a 150 watt heat lamp and hang it so it is 18 inches from the floor of the coop. The chicks then can select the spot where they find comfort.
How many do you have? Where are you keeping them?
I just recently got six white leghorn chicks, and have them in an 8 foot by 8 foot coop. Nothing fancy about the coop, but you must somehow guarantee that critters won't dig under and get the chicks. Mine just has a dirt floor. I ran a 16 inch wide strip of chicken wire around the coop on the outside, laying on the ground and nailed to the coop. I hope this will discourage digging.
Plant a little seed...........
Posts: 821 | Location: N. Utah Zone 4/5 Elev. 5000' | Registered: April 02, 2003
This coop is 8x8 feet. The rear wall is 4 feet tall and the front 6 feet tall. It was built with a bunch of left over stuff, so is not at all fancy, but it has served well for many years. I wish it had taller walls though as I keep hitting my head when in it.
A view of the inside. There is a couple of roosts in the back. One chick is on the roost, and just partly in the picture. Any way this will give you an idea of the equipment I am using for feed and water.
It was cold this morning and you can see there is frost on the window. There is chicken wire behind the glass, and the glass can be moved over or taken out to give ventilation on warm days. In the winter the glass will remain closed, but in summer it will be taken out as soon as the chicks no longer need heat.
Plant a little seed...........
Posts: 821 | Location: N. Utah Zone 4/5 Elev. 5000' | Registered: April 02, 2003
Heat: as mentioned. As in the kitchen, be sure not to overcook your chicken. About 95 degrees the first week, dropping about 5 degrees per week after until they're feathered and are out on their own. Last chick out of the brooder, please turn off the light.
Light: The light you need for heat 24 hours a day in a brooder can also seem to trigger some aggressive behavior in the chicks. I had a pecking problem starting and switched to a red bulb and they seem to enjoy the mellow ambience now. Picture yourself cooped up in a brightly lit office, doing a double-shift with a bunch of bird brains. You will start getting the urge to rip tail-feathers off, too.
Food: A good starter mash. In addition to keeping the feeder full, the first couple of days I usually pile a little on the brooder floor wherever they like to hang out. The chick's instinct is to peck at whatever's around their feet. They will quickly learn what their food is and then there's no stopping them. Some say to keep the feeder full at all times, others say let them get a bit hungry between meals. I tend to be generous the first 8 weeks. After that, they're out doing a bit of part-time foraging for part of their meals.
Water: Always available and always clean. Never let it run dry or remain dirty. If you wouldn't drink it, don't make the birds drink it. It's a bit late now, but day-old chicks sometimes need to be taught what water is. Dip their beaks in it once or twice and they get the idea.
Drafts: Keep chicks out of drafts, in both war and peacetime.
The brooder floor: Don't use cedar shavings. Pine is fine. Some say to not use any shavings for a few days until they are sure of what is and isn't food. Don't use newspaper for small chicks since they don't get much traction from it and can quickly develop leg problems. For the first few days, I use a layer of pine shavings, covered with a piece of old Fiberglas window screening and on top of that, paper towels or an old piece of bed sheet which can be recycled to the compost but not back to the four-poster. Then they are on the shavings litter.
Clean butts: (Not a joke.) Like our human newborns, there is, on occasion, some degree of distasteful "maintenance" that needs to be performed. The sign is a hard clump of chicken poop stuck to the feathers on their butt. Yep, it has to be removed. "Pasty butt" can kill a chick so just take care of it. You bird will thank you for it. (I usually only have to do this a few times during the chicks early weeks so don't worry about having to carry that bulky diaper bag with you every time you go to the coop.)
Animal predators: (for chicks and grown birds.) As mentioned, protect them from critters that dig, like raccoons. Also from winged ones that can swoop down on a bird from the air. Also from the clever ones that can figure out how to open a door latch, like raccoons. Also from ones who can rip through chicken wire, like raccoons. Also from the nasty ones who can stick a long paw through a wire fence to grab a bird and eat what it can through the fence, like a raccoon. (If it sounds like I do not like raccoons, it is only because I don't.)
Human predators: (Chicken thieves.) Don't know what you do with 'em round your parts but here, I suppose we might just feed them to the raccoons.
Have fun with your birds!
Wayne
Where there are gardens and bicycles, there is hope.
Posts: 1368 | Location: Zone 4a, transplanted to the hills of Western Maine. | Registered: October 07, 2005
I have tended to use stuff that was lying around...for 25 chickens I stuck 2 cardboard boxes together...with a door in between. One was the 'warm/darker box' the other was the feed and water room. Since I didn't have a good hot lamp...just a library lamp that didn't seem to give off as much heat as I would like, I put a heating pad on the outside of the 'hot box', up against the wall. I also had half of the top flaps of that box down...to keep in the heat.
Worked fine...used something like that several different times...and never lost a chick (well...except once to the family dog...but that was something else entirely )
Alaskan (gardening in zones 2 to 5)
(*SPRING* avatar...Spring scheduled for May 7th)
Posts: 1805 | Location: Alaska | Registered: January 22, 2003
Much has been learned from you all re: our chicky chicas. Much thanks for all the time it must have taken you both, James and Wayne, in replying.
Right now we have our chicas in, where else, but the "nursery" in our home. It's the room our cutie patootie daughter lived in for the first 3 years of her life, so it seemed only fitting that the new "babes" be raised there too. They are housed in a gigantic metal tub, i believe is the type of tub they leave water out in pastures for the horses (figured i could use it as a raised strawberry or lettuce bed next year to head off those slimy, subversive slugs). We've got a 250W lamp attached to that--the temp ranges from 90-95, but the chicas seem happy.
We've gotten a chk starter mixed with grit and scratch, and per your suggestions we've thrown a little on the pine bedding we are using for them. The bedding is like a Feline Pine pellet that seems to work real well.
It's been so cold here still, we're thinking we won't be able to put our chicas out until their 3 months or so. It's barely getting out of the 50's during the day here.
We're working on coop designs now, so the advice about raccoons and the photos really helped us define what we need. Since we'll need to be able to hear those pesky 'coons at night, i'm wondering if maybe we should place it out in our front yard. We could disguise it at a political sign, "Our Flock is for Barrack!" then maybe our neighbours wouldn't object so much.
I just can't believe how much they change over night--their adult feathers are already starting to come in and it's only been 3 days. My daughter wakes every morning and says, "Wow, look how big they've gotten! Can we name them all Princess Aurora?"
Thanks again, everyone! Best wishes on your chicks as well!
Posts: 34 | Location: Zn 8: South King Co, Western WA | Registered: May 07, 2008
someone else wrote in one time saying that metal flashing slightly underground and then about a foot above ground did a great job at keeping out weasels and stoats.
Alaskan (gardening in zones 2 to 5)
(*SPRING* avatar...Spring scheduled for May 7th)
Posts: 1805 | Location: Alaska | Registered: January 22, 2003
We were fearful of the first introduction to the chicks, but our cat is a super listener (and quite easily trained.) She's learned that she may sit on the bench next to the chicks, but she may not put her paws on the tub. We've been working on the words "chicken" and "no" assoc'd together with her. She's really learned quickly and i feel she knows her limits. I've been letting her smell my hands after holding the chicks and associating those words with that too. Frankly, that this point, i'm more worried about the noise my 5 y/o makes around the chicks. UGH!
We keep them in their own room behind closed doors, so only when an adult is in there to supervise are the cat or the kid allowed in.
Thanks!
Gardening: Just Another Day at the Plant.
Posts: 34 | Location: Zn 8: South King Co, Western WA | Registered: May 07, 2008
Chicks will make a room really dusty in a few weeks. You're probably going to want to get them out of the house sooner than you think. Mine stayed in the kitchen a couple of weeks, then in the mudroom in a larger box for a couple more. Then I finally built them a proper brooder box in the barn.
They're 8 weeks old tomorrow and I finally built a coop. They moved in this past Sunday. Nights still dip into the 30's so there is still a light on in there for warmth.
Wayne
Where there are gardens and bicycles, there is hope.
Posts: 1368 | Location: Zone 4a, transplanted to the hills of Western Maine. | Registered: October 07, 2005
)
They are housed in a gigantic metal tub, i believe is the type of tub they leave water out in pastures for the horses (figured i could use it as a raised strawberry or lettuce bed next year to head off those slimy, subversive slugs). We've got a 250W lamp attached to that--the temp ranges from 90-95, but the chicas seem happy.
)
