Report card.... New Momma here.

[hthompson]

I am just checking with the professionals here to make sure that I am doing well by my chickens.

I feed my 5 - 2 week olds Dumour chick starter/grower. I have a quart sized feeder and right now I am changing it once a day. I am wasting probably 1 cup of feed daily but it generally has some poopies in it so I just want to make sure that it is as clean as possible. I only have to change their waterer once a day as well right now. I am still using the chick starter that I received with my girls. I mix it a teaspoon to a gallon of water and keep in in my fridge. I add a splash ofBragg's ACV to each quart refill in their waterer. They seem to be eating and drinking well.

In addition, I feed them a treat every evening. 3 days a week I have been giving them a third of a mashed up egg. Tonight I ground up some veggies when I was cleaning out my fridge, I added a tablespoon of that over the egg. They scarfed that up! I should add that I had been sprinkling some chick grit over their feed but since I filled my 5 gal bucket of their feed I just added about a cup to the whole bag of food (20 lbs) and mixed it in.

Finally, I am in CT. It has been in the sunny 70's all week. I have been taking their brooder outside the past couple of days for a couple of hours to give them some fresh air. They seem to enjoy it. I haven't let them roam on the grass yet, maybe tomorrow for a little bit, but I don't want to over do it.

They are growing so quickly and changing right before my eyes. I am in utter love!

So any thoughts? Something I can be doing? Something I shouldn't be?

Thank you in advance!

 

[donrae]

Sounds like you're doing great!

My only thought is to be sure they have enough space in the brooder as they grow. You didn't say how large it is, but a good square foot each will cut down behavior problems.

I say let them eat grass! If they were raised by a momma hen, they'd be out from under her much of the day, scratching around, exploring what is good to eat, taking little dust baths. If you already have a run set up that's safe, you could let them out there for a couple hours.