This topic may have been more appropriate for the Emergencies/ Diseases forum, but with all the really sickly chicken posts over there I thought maybe having these questions answered here would benifit some of the other newbies like me too who are getting ready for their first babies to arrive and not get in the way of any of those with more serious issues. If it should be somewhere else, mod's please feel free to move it.
I was wondering some things regarding general routine health care for a small urban flock of half a dozen chickens or less.
1. Wormers- first done at what age and then how often? Every Spring? What to use? Does the food grade DE cover all worms? Should you even worm them if they have normal poo?
2. Mites, Fleas, etc- Can I keep the coop and run area dusted with Sevin dust to keep the pests away or would that harm the chickens? I ask because we already have fleas starting up here and since we have indoor/outdoor animals I must treat the yard for them somehow. I know wild birds carry mites and I assume these would also affect pet birds.
3. Electrolytes We have 100 degree days here in the summer and I will have cochins who are fully feathered by the time it gets that hot. The coop and run will be shaded, but hot is hot so should I add the electrolytes to the water as a preventive to heat stroke daily after the temp reaches a certain degree and if so what? Any other hot weather precautions? A fan blowing on one area of the run or a mister set up? Ice cubes in the water maybe? Don't laugh it's an honest question!
4. Supplements I understand commercial feed has pretty much all of what they need right? You supply grit in a seperate feeder once you begin offering them anything other than the commercial feed. What about other supplements, like calcium of some form? If so, what form? I know they make vitamins for poultry, but if the feed has it all, when do you use them?
Any other routine care or maitenance tips would be appreciated. I'm sure these questions have all be asked a million times, but when I try to use the search feature for them I am overwhelmed at the amount of posts and it is hard to find the specific answers. Maybe all the current newbies should list a barage of questions in one topic, all you experienced folks could answer them for us and then the mods could sticky it somewhere?
I was wondering some things regarding general routine health care for a small urban flock of half a dozen chickens or less.
1. Wormers- first done at what age and then how often? Every Spring? What to use? Does the food grade DE cover all worms? Should you even worm them if they have normal poo?
2. Mites, Fleas, etc- Can I keep the coop and run area dusted with Sevin dust to keep the pests away or would that harm the chickens? I ask because we already have fleas starting up here and since we have indoor/outdoor animals I must treat the yard for them somehow. I know wild birds carry mites and I assume these would also affect pet birds.
3. Electrolytes We have 100 degree days here in the summer and I will have cochins who are fully feathered by the time it gets that hot. The coop and run will be shaded, but hot is hot so should I add the electrolytes to the water as a preventive to heat stroke daily after the temp reaches a certain degree and if so what? Any other hot weather precautions? A fan blowing on one area of the run or a mister set up? Ice cubes in the water maybe? Don't laugh it's an honest question!
4. Supplements I understand commercial feed has pretty much all of what they need right? You supply grit in a seperate feeder once you begin offering them anything other than the commercial feed. What about other supplements, like calcium of some form? If so, what form? I know they make vitamins for poultry, but if the feed has it all, when do you use them?
Any other routine care or maitenance tips would be appreciated. I'm sure these questions have all be asked a million times, but when I try to use the search feature for them I am overwhelmed at the amount of posts and it is hard to find the specific answers. Maybe all the current newbies should list a barage of questions in one topic, all you experienced folks could answer them for us and then the mods could sticky it somewhere?