Raising chicks in the house?

[Cindiloohoo]

Fair warning, no matter how clean you try to keep it the smell and dust is horrible. If you can, I'd brood outside. Yes, even with just 3 little chickies.

 

[Tera]

Thank you all so much for your replies. Now I really can't wait til we get them here and hatched. This is going to be so much fun!

 

[ConservativeRed]

Well after reading a lot on raising chicks, I decided to try it. We are going to raise two (2) indoors. I bought a cardboard brooder today at D&B Supply along with some Cedar Shavings. Oops! well from reading that was not a good idea. it's toxic at least from what I read so I have to take em back and exchange em for pine shaving. That's fine I have to get some Chick Stater anyway and they have 25lb for $7.99 I just figured cedar shaving would cut the smell since we were planning on raising them indoors. What I don't know is how long normally do you keep them indoors before putting them out in the pen with the other hens? How long on the chick starter before I can give them The Layena like I do the others. Thanks for any help.

 

[Fierlin1182]

We've always raised our chicks indoors, it's nice to hear them peeping from the store room when we get up at night.
It never did smell really bad with just the two at a time - don't know if our house just has really good ventilation, or something. But we changed their bedding (just used newspaper - got them at two weeks of age, so they weren't too small) every day and always made sure the windows were open.

Good luck, I hope you enjoy your chicks!

 

[ConservativeRed]

Well durn! Now I read on another website that you shouldn't put pine shaving down for the chicks for the 1st two weeks because they won't know the difference for a little bit between pine chips and food. They are still learning? Is this true? Because when I go to D&B Supply, they have all of their chicks on shavings.

 

[ButchGood]

Ive been raising 16 chicks in a spare bedroom for 1 week today. So far I see no dust settling anywhere and there is no smell at all. I was planning on setting up a larger brooder in my brand new empty coop that I built for them as soon as they grow out of the indoor brooder. Im thinking at the rate there growing that will be (Tomorrow ) no should be about week 3. I'll just hang my heat lamp from the rafters and finish them up in there.

 

[gryeyes]

Oh, pshaw! Pine shavings are fine from day one.... Although I do put that textured, washable shelf lining stuff down for the first week, myself. I put it over the pine shavings, then remove it when they are well aware where their food is located. They'll taste the shavings, and run around with a bit in their beaks, playing keep-away, but chick feed tastes much better.

 

[mommabice]

I have found a way to keep down dust...I stopped using pine. I put play sand (like for a sand box) in the bottom of our large brooder. No crazy dust kick up (we have tall walls on the brooder), and you can just scoop the poop off the top of the sand. Also perfect for a dust bath.

We did this b/c the closest place that sells pine shavings is the TSC about 30 minutes away. All the places in town only sell cedar for dogs. I didn't want to drive to go get fresh pine so often, so sand was the other option, and we like it!

 

[horseshowmomnv]

Quote:
I completely agree they will never be in the house again. I would rather have the kitty litter box in my house than chickens with the HUGE amount of dust! I thought I could handle the dust since I have horses, the horses don't begin to compare to the chicken dust.

 

[horseshowmomnv]

Ive been raising 16 chicks in a spare bedroom for 1 week today. So far I see no dust settling anywhere and there is no smell at all. I was planning on setting up a larger brooder in my brand new empty coop that I built for them as soon as they grow out of the indoor brooder. Im thinking at the rate there growing that will be (Tomorrow ) no should be about week 3. I'll just hang my heat lamp from the rafters and finish them up in there.

I did not notice the dust until about 2 weeks.