Leave them in the incubator till they dry out, or put them into the brooder to dry. It makes no difference as long as you have a nice warm brooder. Since it's your second go, you must have a brooder setup that works.
You will have to learn how to process your chickens and eat them.
If you have livestock, you will have deadstock, so you will soon get used to the concept of getting rid of dead birds, and then culling defective birds, and eventually plucking, gutting and cooking surplus chickens.
Great article. Thanks.
I would only add that keeping them in a tiny enclosure makes hygiene more important. All that feed and water that goes in one end of a chicken will inevitably come out of the other end -- The manure load will increase rapidly and will host all sorts of nasties from...
Good article.
I would add a couple of things. Firstly, table scraps and etc. that has a lot of salt is not a great idea -- chickens have an evolutionary ancient digestive system where food is soaked and then ground up with grit. Very salty treats draw water and disrupt things.
The other...
It is probably just learning how to lay eggs. They can lay funnylooking eggs, tiny eggs, shellless eggs, double yolks etc. until they get the hang if it.
Almost all chick deaths and deformities are the result of incorrect temperature and humidity.
This is because the "hobbyist" incubators are mostly crap. My recommendation would be to do one of four things:
1 -- Get a real incubator. You can get Chinese commercial incubators online. These will...
The permethrin (Frontline) works well, but it is systemic and you are eating the eggs.
They say it is no problem, but isn't it? The same people who say you can eat permethrin eggs allow smoking, spraying Roundup, and etc. And used to allow DDT, Red Dye #3, Asbestos, and other things --...
The rats only come out at night, as a general rule, unless you have an infestation.
You can get a metal dustbin and put the feeder in that at night when you put the chickens to bed, and take it back out in the morning when you let them out. This will generally be all you need to do. You should...
Exactly -- they are bug burds and don't need to hurt themselves jumping off a high perch
Aha -- you are in the UK. I kept chickens in Devon for many years.
Your fence looks great -- They won't be leaving, no dog will worry them and nothing will get in. By the way -- cats won't bother your...
Orpingtons are big and heavy and won't get out. If you are concerned about it, cut the primary wing feathers on one wing (not both) -- if they try to fly they become unbalanced.
Of more concern with fences is things getting in.
Lay down a 2ft strip of chicken wire on the ground outside the...
It's looking pretty good on the whole. There are a few things I would do differently, but it will work as it is, so don't feel cmpelled to take any of it seriously.
1-- Yes, the nest boxes should have a sloping top so their roof does not become a toilet.
2 -- Round off the corners of the 2x4...