Baby Chicks Food PRE Starter Feed

sheilawagner

Songster
9 Years
Jul 16, 2010
318
7
146
Pacific NorthWest
I just read another thread about baby chicks dying, and some have stated that it could be the lack of heat lamps, not having starter chick feed as reasons. That got me thinking, and I didn't want to hijack that thread.

Have you thought about what baby chicks used to eat for these past hundreds and thousands of years, before the Pet food companies started providing chick starter feed?

When I was young, my grandma had chickens and chicks running around in the village. I came from South East Asia, and we were not fancy farmers, and I know for a FACT, my grandma did not feed special chicken feed, or for that matter, chick starter feed. They free ranged all day, and ate leftover kitchen scraps, store bought corn or other grains. But all the chicks did fine. I used to chase them and play with them growing up.

Strange how now some of us may think, "oh, if the chick doesn't have starter feed, or no gro-gel, then its going to die." The chicks of yester-year must have been much hardier. Or maybe, we are just brainwashed by many pet food companies, and think some things are more necessary than they really are. I'm keeping my mind open here...

Now, I feed my chickens gro-gel, boiled egg, cabbage, lettuce, all kinds of goodies, and plus all the chicken feed they want, plus I have a worm bin going to provide an unlimited source of red worms, and then I think of other ways I can spoil them. Cold frosty mornings, I wake up early to make them oats in hot water to warm up their bellies, and give them nice cool fruit and veges in summer. All I can say is "Sigh, the chickens I had when I was growing up, and the chickens I have now, are eating entirely different things.."
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Am I making them tougher, or softer? I'm just saying...
 
I understand where your coming from. I was thinking about the whole heat lamp thing. 95 degrees till what ever then dropping the temp down and so on... I have 9 babies with a broody right now. Their outside in an uninsulated coop with no heat lamp. It's gotten as low as 21 degrees and they have done fine. I also open the door to the coop that their in every morning and they shoot out of there running around. Now I live in Louisiana so we don't have super cold weather but still alot colder than what you "should" have babies in.
 

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