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agreed, new chicks are totally messy
that's why I didn't like chips -- for the first week or so, the chicks were on chips with a big incontinence pad underneath to absorb the liquid stuff ... I had scored a bunch of Depends on Freecycle and the gal also gave me the bed pads (her dad had moved to a care home, so she didn't need the supplies any more)
but the chicks kept trying to eat the chips, and the edges of the pad, so I put spare branches and 2x4 scraps around the perimeter, and put in a mini-roost near the heating panel
they liked to roost so the debris built up mostly underneath that area .... so I put sheets of newspaper down over the pad instead; those I could just yank out, wad up, and throw in the compost ... and didn't use any more chips
the 2x4s also came in handy; I put the feeder and waterer up on blocks so the chicks didn't scratch crud into them, and so they didn't perch on them and poo ... once they started jumping and flying (didn't take long), I put pointed paper cups on the top of the glass canning quart jars I was using with the feeder and waterer bases (heavier than the plastic ones I saw in the store, easier to see the levels, and easier to wash out)
ETA: of course I had only SEVEN baby chicks; you've got five from the first lot and potentially, what? sixteen? from the second ....
I've often wondered if we ought to get one of those rolls of exam-table paper that hospitals, clinics, and doctors use ... just feed it in one end of the brooder, let it get soiled, and yank it out the other end (with a larger flap on the "used" end, only a small slit where it comes in) ... I can visualize the chicks acting like people on those artificial carpeted motorized ski hills .... or on a treadmill ...
Chicks are tidy compared to the people I live with. I've managed to get all my daily chores done and the first five chicks moved into the bathroom near your heater and surrounded by heated socks full of rice.
The sixth egg has hatched, three more are pipped, and
tomorrow is day 21, so I'm not discounting my chickens before they're hatched
I have a Cristina, two Anitras, and a Phoebe for sure, plus one out of a pale-aqua egg that it cut in half and moved the cap into the bottom, so to speak.
Examination room paper has its attractions, no doubt; at the moment I'm wrapping the heat-sources in foolscap from various things that have come via UPS. Also, I am thanking whatever friendly spirit (possibly the same one who kept the Hamburgs safe when I forgot to close their pen) who gave us the impulse to buy on-sale pizzas at Freddie's on Sunday so dinner is a lock.
I started writing this answer at least a half-hour ago, have given the "old" chicks clean water and put water in with the new chicks along with a reheated hot sock, Some where in there I put a hook on the bathroom door and let the cats out of their jail. I'm sort of too tired to think at this point, which means I'm going to check the Hamburg's gate before it gets any darker.
Life, man, what a trip.
