All my other chickens came as tweens, teens and adults. We had one hen go broody, but she raised her own babies! Now I'm sadly down to three laying hens (RIR) and one old lady in henopause, and a young Buff Orpington roo my neighbor gave us. He's such a pretty, big boy my husband suggested we get more.
Enter Tractor Supply. I wanted 4 more hens. As sexing chicks isn't an exact science, hubby said get 8! I was only prepared for 4, so they were crowded into a tote for a week or so. Now we've moved them into this large brooder. I think they're roughly 3 weeks old. Today we made them roosts. They are quite disinterested. I dug up some soil from my garden that's quite sandy, sanitized it in the oven, and used that to give them a dust bath. They LOST their tiny minds! They all mobbed it, ate it, scratched it, and practically emptied the cake pan its in. Guess I'll try again with a bigger pan! The lamp keeps the room about 75°. In the lamp side it's about 83° currently.
We're building a brooder/separation area attached to the coop that we plan to put them in at about 6-8 weeks. It will have a pop door into the coop, so they can get in there once they're used to each other a bit, and we can leave the door half down, so the chicks can get into their own space, but the big girls can't. From there they'll get out to the run. There's no way to really start them in the run first.
So, that's the plan. What do you think? Attached are pics of the chicks, current brooder, and an old pic of the main coop, which is inside another building. We'll be adding the brooder off to the side with the door where the bale of shavings is.
Enter Tractor Supply. I wanted 4 more hens. As sexing chicks isn't an exact science, hubby said get 8! I was only prepared for 4, so they were crowded into a tote for a week or so. Now we've moved them into this large brooder. I think they're roughly 3 weeks old. Today we made them roosts. They are quite disinterested. I dug up some soil from my garden that's quite sandy, sanitized it in the oven, and used that to give them a dust bath. They LOST their tiny minds! They all mobbed it, ate it, scratched it, and practically emptied the cake pan its in. Guess I'll try again with a bigger pan! The lamp keeps the room about 75°. In the lamp side it's about 83° currently.
We're building a brooder/separation area attached to the coop that we plan to put them in at about 6-8 weeks. It will have a pop door into the coop, so they can get in there once they're used to each other a bit, and we can leave the door half down, so the chicks can get into their own space, but the big girls can't. From there they'll get out to the run. There's no way to really start them in the run first.
So, that's the plan. What do you think? Attached are pics of the chicks, current brooder, and an old pic of the main coop, which is inside another building. We'll be adding the brooder off to the side with the door where the bale of shavings is.
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