rules
Hatching
Hi all! I wanted to share with you all our experience and pictures so far with our Cornish Cross chicks. We brought the chicks home on April 23rd, so they will be four weeks old this coming Thursday, May 19th.
We built a wooden brooder with solid top on one side and chicken-wire top on the other to allow for some ventilation.
We placed all 100 chicks in the brooder house and watched them settle in.
In the first two weeks, we 'lost' five of the chicks. Most seemed as though they had been trampled, though I am sure they had more than enough room to not crowd.
Sasha was excited about the chicks from the moment we brought them home. She would sprint from the house out to the shed to go check on them.
Fast forwarding a few weeks, these pictures were taken yesterday, when we moved the chicks into the tractors. My husband and father constructed this tractor (and one other just like it in case they need the room). The temperature was up to 60 during the day and down to 35 at night. We have two heat lamps going on under the tarp as well as a 3-gallon waterer. We have a rope system hooked up to the tractor and can pull it with the lawn tractor to move it when needed.
As you can see, Sasha's amusement for the chicks hasn't skipped a beat.
This is where the chicks will spend their next few weeks. They seemed pretty unsure at first about the soft grass on their feet and what they were supposed to do, but they seem to be settling in pretty well.
We have lost a total of seven chicks (so far) out of 100 and have learned a TON in this first go-around. What do you think of our setup and what we have done so far? Constructive advice is always welcome!
We built a wooden brooder with solid top on one side and chicken-wire top on the other to allow for some ventilation.
We placed all 100 chicks in the brooder house and watched them settle in.
In the first two weeks, we 'lost' five of the chicks. Most seemed as though they had been trampled, though I am sure they had more than enough room to not crowd.
Sasha was excited about the chicks from the moment we brought them home. She would sprint from the house out to the shed to go check on them.
Fast forwarding a few weeks, these pictures were taken yesterday, when we moved the chicks into the tractors. My husband and father constructed this tractor (and one other just like it in case they need the room). The temperature was up to 60 during the day and down to 35 at night. We have two heat lamps going on under the tarp as well as a 3-gallon waterer. We have a rope system hooked up to the tractor and can pull it with the lawn tractor to move it when needed.
As you can see, Sasha's amusement for the chicks hasn't skipped a beat.
This is where the chicks will spend their next few weeks. They seemed pretty unsure at first about the soft grass on their feet and what they were supposed to do, but they seem to be settling in pretty well.
We have lost a total of seven chicks (so far) out of 100 and have learned a TON in this first go-around. What do you think of our setup and what we have done so far? Constructive advice is always welcome!
