Grit

[3girlschicks]

Im new to the chick thing. I just got 3 chicks, they are doing good, eating the feed & drinking water. I would lik to start giving them some treats but Im dont want to hurt them. Any suggestions on what I could give them? They are a little over a wk old. What is this "grit" stuff I keep reading about.

 

[NWchickenLuv]

They shouldn't get treats for a little while, a few weeks at least. I know chicken don't have teeth so they need the grit to process their food. However chick starter is really soft and cumbley so they don't need grit. Mine are 7 weeks and I plan on giving them yogurt this week... but you don't want to cause diarrhea by giving them too much extra stuff. They need all the nutrients in the chick feed.

Here is a treat chart you might find useful: https://www.backyardchickens.com/web/viewblog.php?id=2593-Treats_Chart

 

[NWchickenLuv]

This topic will also be useful


https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=64387

I tried to feed my girls yogurt 2 weeks ago but they didn't even want anything to do with it. But now at 7 weeks they are so curious I think they will really enjoy it!

 

[finnleyjo]

My chicks are 2 wks old today. I started giving them treats last week. Not every day, and not much. They have had yogurt and a little left over hard boiled egg. I put in a little chick grit in their brooder a couple of times too.

If they were outside with a mama hen they would be eating little treats that she found for them so I'm not too worried about giving them a little treat here and there.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Quote:
Welcome to this forum. Get ready to meet some nice folks here.

You'll get a lot of different advise here on giving chicks treats. I don't know that there is a right answer. My suggestion is that if you do give treats, start with only one item, give small amounts to give their systems time to adjust, and observe them for a couple of days to see that it is not upsetting their system until you try something different.

As mentioned, chickens have no molars to grind food. They have a gizzard in their digestive system that grinds the food for them. For the gizzard to work, they need to eat what is called grit. This is small rocks or sand that actually does the grinding in the gizzard. Baby chicks need a fairly fine sand, not rocks. For young chicks, parakeet grit from a pet store works well but you can just use fine sand. As long as all they eat is chick starter, they don't need grit. For some treats,they don't need grit but for other treats they do. As I do not know for sure which treats need grit, I believe in providing grit to them before feeding any treats. Giving them grit won't hurt them, whether you give them treats or not. Not giving them grit might hurt them if you feed treats.