Hatching Chicks, the old fashioned way. Now what?

[whitutis]

Good morning,

our b.o. has been sitting on some fertile eggs we received about 3 weeks ago. this will be the first time we've experienced chickens raising chicks and we are as nervous as grandparents with a pregnant daughter in law. ) we are so perplexed, because the only info we can find on hatching chicks is incubating by humans.

we need to know what we need to do with our flock after Mama chicken hatches these chicks. we have a completely fenced run built onto our coop, so we are planning on building a separate roosting/nesting area for the auntie chickens in the run and speparating the mama and her chicks for a while.

will we need special chick feed and vitamin water and all that again (like we used when we raised our chicks from the feed store?) or will Mama take care of feeding them.

our nesting boxes are about 2.5-3 feet up in the wall in the coop. should we make a little box on the floor for Mama and the babies, or will she be able to get the babies out of the nest okay?

any advice you have to share would be great.
thanks!

 

[HenMamma]

Hello,

You will need chick starter, but you won't need the vitamin water.

I would also put them a little lower to the ground, the babies will follow mama out of the nest, don't need any accidents!

 

[The Wolf Queen]

You will need chick starter and a box on the ground, for instance, a milk crate on its side. Also for the 1rst 3 days to a week depending. Mix hot water with KARO syrup then add some cold water to cool it. Its sorta a natural booster and an old fashion recipe my grandparents used.

 

[whitutis]

thanks you both for the advice.

this is so exciting!!

a ? i forgot to ask is how long should we keep the Aunties separate from Mama and the babies? anyone with advice?