How do you personally raise your baby chicks

[nikischicks]

Reading your post again chickee, I really like how you are doing it. I could do a chick house and attach a run next to the main run so they could see the others. Do you have any pics of your setup with your main chickens and your chick house?

 

[PunkinPeep]

I integrate my chicks with the flock asap. I have all generations running together, and i really like it that way. You have a little more cold to deal with, so you'll have to adjust for that.

But here's what i do. Once the chicks are feathered out enough to be safe in the coop, i put them in a wire cage inside the coop. The adults free range full time, so my run doesn't get much use anymore. So i use it for the chicks. I let the chicks run the run while the adults free range. This works out great. I have tried letting the little ones free range at many different ages, and i am most comfortable with about 8 weeks - not so much because of danger from the adults. They really don't bother the babies at all. But i have found that i lose a lot of babies if they free range earlier than that....to predators, to exhaustion, to not realizing if they have cocci or digestive problems that i'm not noticing. Keeping them confined, but still exposed to the soil is the best of both worlds. I think that what i do might not work if i didn't have as much space, so you have to adjust for that.

As to broodies, i think it depends a lot on the broodies. I have gotten to where i do the same thing with the broody mama and babies, until the babies get feathered out. My broodies brood very well, but sometimes when it rains or if they have too many to keep track of, they let the babies fend for themselves, and then i have losses. I will put the broody and babies in the run during the day - and then back in the coop at night, no cage needed inside. I play that situation by ear some, and i try to observe how well they're doing and when i need to intervene in raising the chicks.

 

[chickee]

Quote:
My chicken house is made out of a tree house/ playhouse that belonged to my niece. It is elevated off of the ground so my husband built a house for the chicks directly under the top house at ground level. Both top and bottom houses are 5 x 5 feet. There are two yards so I can seperate my chickens when needed. Right now all my extra roos are in the lower yard sharing it with my 5 week old Ameraucana chicks. Roosters and chicks are seperated by a fence of large window screens wired together to section off the end of the lower pen where the door to the chick house is. The only picture I have is of the front chicken yard and house. I think you can make out the two yards and upper and lower houses. We just closed in the deck (not in picture) of the playhouse to make another room for my growing chicken hobby!

 

[Beekissed]

Like get them in January, and keep the current girls until my new ones are ready to take over the coup outside?

This is ideally a good time to get chicks if you have a broody. If you don't, then maybe wait until you normally have broodies going to nest. That way you won't need a heat lamp and your chicks will get the best of care....just slip them under her in the night and have a happy hen in the morning.

I have a separate, but still adjacent and visual, broody pen for mama and chicks. When the chicks have some plummage covering their torsos pretty well, I integrate them and Mom into the flock.

I normally let a broody hen brood my new chicks or hatch her own to replenish the flock...depends on if I need a new breed or blood into the flock or not.

I like my chicks to be out on the grass as soon as possible. I've never had a problem with the other birds picking on or hurting any of my chicks.​

 

[abhaya]

I have 1 medium amd 1 extra large dog kennel that I use for brooding chicks. They go in the little one while small then move to the big one and anout 2 to 3 weeks. When they are fully fledged they go out into the silkie coop as they are very gentle and will show them the chicken ropes so to speak. and the big girls get to see and hear them. then when they get to big for the silkie coop and things start to get crowded. They go to the big coop with the big girls. I dont know if it is the best set up but it works so far.