Newbie help.

Hello, I am a brand new owner of six baby chicks. Three are yellow and three are a mixture of black and yellow. I got them from TSC and they were labeled as "pullets." Unfortunately the employees could not tell me what breed they were nor could he tell me what hatchery they came from. So now I have a couple of questions for the group.....
1. I did not buy medicated feed and now I see a LITTLE red in their poop. Is this normal or is this an early sign of illness? I am feed them Dumor chick feed. This is non-medicated.
2. When I change the pine bedding I take them outside to the run and let them walk around a little. Is this ok or is it too early? I bought the chicks on 3/26/2016.
Thank you for any advice.

AgentBobb said:

Hello, I am a brand new owner of six baby chicks. Three are yellow and three are a mixture of black and yellow. I got them from TSC and they were labeled as "pullets." Unfortunately the employees could not tell me what breed they were nor could he tell me what hatchery they came from. So now I have a couple of questions for the group.....
1. I did not buy medicated feed and now I see a LITTLE red in their poop. Is this normal or is this an early sign of illness? I am feed them Dumor chick feed. This is non-medicated.
2. When I change the pine bedding I take them outside to the run and let them walk around a little. Is this ok or is it too early? I bought the chicks on 3/26/2016.
Thank you for any advice.

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Too early really for outside. I usually keep mine in a box while I clean things out, maybe by 2 or 3 weeks depending on your temperatures. Non medicated feed should be fine, but I am not sure what you would find that was red.

Thanks for the reply! After closer inspection I figured out that the "redish tint" was because of the red brooder light. I assumed it was from coccidiosis. I feel like a dummy.

I brood outside, but am also located on coastal Alabama.
If the weather is decent, time outside is good. Chicks raised by their mom venture out from her and then back under to warm up as needed.

Take some detailed photos of your chicks and go post them on "What breed or gender is this" forum and the folks over there can tell you what breeds they are.

As for taking your chicks outdoors, it's actually beneficial in a number of ways.

During the first week, chicks have a window of opportunity to be exposed to the local bacteria in your soil, both good ones and not-so-good ones, and developing immunity to the bad ones.

In addition to this, being exposed to cooler temperatures for brief periods will serve to stimulate feather growth, gradually encouraging their bodies to become cold tolerant. In other words, if it's a nice day, over 75 the first week, 70 the second week, with no cool breezes, the chicks can handle fifteen minutes to half an hour away from their heated brooder.

You can increase the time spent outdoors as they grow older, feather out, and show that they are comfortable in the cooler temperatures by not immediately huddling together for warmth. This will prepare them to move smoothly from brooder to coop when the time arrives because they will not have to acclimate, since they already are doing it.

Some of us are discovering that the heat guidelines for brooding chicks and the practice of keeping chicks confined to a heated brooder for four to eight weeks is simply not the best thing for the development of chicks.

I wrote an article about it, linked below under "Articles by azygous". It's the one on brooding outdoors.