Day Old Babies on Paper Towels?

I just use shavings... the local feed store where I get chicks has them in brooder cages with wire bottoms. I use a plastic dog crate as my brooder cage, with the lamp clipped onto the wire on the side. Shavings have worked well for me, although they do scratch them into the water:-)
 

I think the reasoning for the paper towels over the shavings the first couple days is so that they learn where their food is and don't eat the shavings. I'm not sure if it works or not, my first chicks are only a week old (so I'm very unexperienced too). I used the paper towels for a couple days then just shavings and they're doing great so far. But I've heard plenty of people on here saying you don't need them. 

Have fun with your new chicks! Make sure to come back and share pictures! 

You put them on paper towels so they don't eat the pine bedding. After they are a few days old they are smart enough not to eat the bedding. I kept paper towels for 2 weeks. Good luck!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hazard 

Has anyone heard about putting the baby chicks on paper towels for the first day?

We that do Quail use paper towels the first few days.There so small they get lost in Shavings.LOL  Baby Chicks are fine in shavings....Might consider covering concrete floor with a layer or2 of Cardboard ..Concrete is generally cold this time of year and them little burgers will dig down and be on that cold concrete...cva34 

 I used paper towls for the first 4 weeks until they started shredding them. They have beautiful strong legs now. I think it just gives them a more balanced surface and helps those tendons in their legs develop. Now at 4-1/2 weeks they are scratching happily and jumping on branches and roosting. I believe the towels are a good thing. Also in the first few weeks, all I had to do was roll up the towels and throw them away. It became kinda a game, and they'd jump on the top of the roll and I'd roll it up and pull them along on the towels as I rolled, they were quite silly and we bonded that way

Put down paper for the 1st week or so until you know that all the chicks are feeding and drinking. Each day you can add another layer of paper right on top of the previous day's layer. This will keep the mess down and the chicks won't be pecking at their fecal material and getting it all over them.

Once all the chicks are drinking and eating properly and all looks good, just roll up the layers of paper and throw it all away, The chicks will then be on woodshavings...or whatever you had under the paper.

I just hatched 32 last week.  I put mine on Equine Fresh pellets.  I have to say I love it.  It has worked much better than pine shavings so far.  No body is scratching shavings into the water.  If one of the pellets does get into the water it just dissolves into a fine crumble like the chick starter.  No smell so far and you can't even see the poop.  The chicks are scratching through and eating the starter they have kicked out onto the floor of the brooder.  I have a chick feeder and a couple of very shallow dishes with feed in them for the smaller chicks as they are reluctant to stick their heads into the feeder in the beginning. 

I would highly recommend the pellets.  This is my third batch of chicks, and the pellets are working much better than the shavings for me.