Are 7 chicks too overwhelming for a single teenager to take care of?

[Barbeque]

The deal was I take care of them and pay for them, I get them.
Will it be to overwhelming? ;/
I hope not, I love the little feathery friends, so cute.
So far I've changed their water (keep knocking shavings into it!) and cleaned up the poop they have left in various placed on me and
the counters and such. Ewwwie! ;p And I have been giving them a lot of love. They even all have their own blanket. I call it the
poop blanket. haha.
Anyways, I am worried about the future, having to make a chicken tractor. I have to pay for it and make it(with my grandpa and dad's help though, of course) I just don't know how or if I'll have money! But i'll cross that bridge when I come to it.
Obviously, I worry a LOT, so I'll ask many questions on here.
Thank goodness there is an active site with helpful, knowledgeable, and experienced people on it!

 

[kelseygirl707]

Well it sounds like you are doing good so far. Do you have a brooder and heat lamp for them? As for affording a tractor, they are expensive, but you can look for used materials to make it with. My Husband and I are building ours, and even with recycled Plywood we are looking at about $200 to build it, at least. Good luck!

 

[paddock36]

If you are responsible enough than you can do it, but you can't just put them off like unwanted homework and expect them to be ok. As far a building the coop. As long as you have access to tools you can do that too. You might check in the classified adds or on freecycle for anyone giving things away that you could use to build. I've gotten old cages, pallets, and all kinds of stuff on free cycle that I have built with. I'm far from a teen, but free is free no matter what age you are.

 

[debilorrah]

BBQ my dear. You are clearly in love with those chicks, and you are doing everything right. Please remember that they grow out of cute into full grown chickens. 7 is not too many at all if you are committed to treating them well for the rest of their lives. But the cute does go away... unless you are like me and thing their goofiness is cute too.

As a matter of fact, they get pretty durned ugly there at about 8 weeks

 

[Katy]

They'll be ready for the tractor, or some sort of outdoor pen and run before you know it, so you need to start working on getting that started ASAP.

 

[A.T. Hagan]

I would not bring chicks home BEFORE you have their adult housing ready. They don't stay small for very long and crowding brings on a myriad of stress related problems such as pecking and cannibalism. Get your housing ready THEN bring home the chicks.

As for whether it's too much for you or not only you can answer that. They have to be fed, watered, their bedding kept acceptably clean, sufficiently warm, but not too warm, protected from predators (most especially pets in the home), irresponsible younger siblings, and have good air flow.

At my house the animals are fed and watered before the people are. That goes a long ways towards preventing "I meant to do that", "I forgot", and "I didn't have time." Most especially as chicks they are solely dependent upon YOU for their survival. No excuses. It has to be done right and on time. If you don't then you get to face the joys of dealing with dead and dying chicks.

This sounds a bit harsh and it is. But that is what life is like when you take on responsibility for the lives of others.

If you are certain you can meet those challenges then go for it.

But get their housing ready FIRST.

.....Alan.

 

[americana-chick]

I am a teenager too and I have been raising chickens my whole life. Sometimes you might feel like you just want to give up, but trust me things will get better

I always have to pay for my chicks/chickens and raise them by myself (it cracks me up when my bro thinks that the chickens will like him as much as they like me

) My dad and I built the chickens very first coop together and it was greta and i had a lot of fun.
It sounds like you will do just fine and are already doing great with them

 

[yotetrapper]

Sounds like she already has the chicks, Alan. So BBQ, do you have any way to make money? If you have any little free classified papers like a pennysaver, or buyer, or something like that, you could post an ad that you're a kid and looking for cheap materials for building a chicken coop. Bet you'd get some stuff for free. If you have an allowance, or can work a part time job, NOW is the time to be buying stuff for the coop. Assuming your chicks are dayolds now, in June they'll be needing there coop already!

 

[bakerjw]

You may post on craigs list looking for an old shed or similar to use as a coop. I saw a local post where some young kids were looking for materials so that they could start raising chickens as a business. A lot of people really like to help out motivated kids and it takes motivation to handle livestock in a responsible manner.

Chicks are cute but they are much funner when they get several weeks old. Some of the things that they do always make me laugh. Try transferring 8 7 week old chicks from an indoor pen to an outdoor pen sometime. Or discovering one morning that they really prefer sleeping all over the garage rather than in their holding pen. Crazy birds.