WAY WORRIED about combining ages! Age of newest chicks? Yikes!

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I was worried about that two when I was combining my chicks. Not to mention these are our first chicks ever! I have 3 3+ week olds, 5 2+ week olds, and 2 roo chicks that are bout a week and a half. They are all doing just fine! The older ones fly the coop and are outta the brooder before I know it, and the younger ones do too if can get enough height!
 
I'm just curious if anyone else has the problem of constantly cleaning pine shaving outta water and food!!! They go crazy scratching and it's flying everywhere! Lol it's funny to watch them but a pain keeping clean water and food.
 
I think they would be fine. There's a member on here, @chickencrazy429 , that has raised four chicks, one of which was a week older than the next two, who were a week ahead of the last chick. I don't think she had many problems.
 
brood mother said:
Ok how does that work, the 1 liter bottle? How do you hang it. I am assuming it has to hang upside down with nipple on bottom? Where can I get a nipple?
Click to expand...

You can get the poultry nipples on ebay and many hatchery sites. Push in ones are best for thick plastic container like pvc or 5 gallon bucket and heavy duty screw in ones are best for thin plastic like cola bottle caps. For my cola bottle ones I have a hole at the bottom of the bottle for venting and I pop a hook in there and hook the other end to the side of my brooder. Outside I have a water drum with a pvc pipe that goes into the coop for their main waterer and several 5 gallon buckets on stands threw out the yard for their free range supply. Most people don't need this much water but I live in a very hot climate and heat stress with lack of water will take a chicken down faster then you can blink here. Remember to use plumbers tape on the threads if you are having any leaking issues. You could also use a rabbit water holder to hold it on to the side of your cage if you have thin walls or wire on part of your brooder.
 
What I did was drill a hole in the bottle cap and then used a screw in nipple and put it right in there- be sure to make the drill hole a tiny bit smaller than the screw in part so that it doesn't drip extra water. I think most drills bits are a bit smaller for it anyway, I've even had to work with it to make it a little wider to accommodate the nipple. Like foreverlearning does, I would poke a hole at the bottom part of the bottle (which will be the top when all said and done) so that it will dispense the water correctly. At first, I didn't do this, and they got water out at first, but then it made a vacuum and they couldn't get any out.
idunno.gif
You can also put some wire or heavy duty string through there, or what I did was just make a sort of holder out of some wire (you could use heavy duty string as well). Let's see if I can get a picture...

Ah, yes, my hillbilly-rigged waterer!



I don't know how much they cost on the hatchery sites, but I've had good luck with EBay. This one here ships within the US, which makes it a lot faster getting to you. I think I waited what seemed like forever for mine to come from Hong Kong.. I don't think you can buy them singly either, but you never know when a nipple might come in handy!!
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http://www.ebay.com/itm/10-Pack-Wat...739?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item258b135c1b


Also works great on 5 gal. buckets for the big kid chickens! And despite what some people might think or believe, even 1 day old chicks can learn this waterer! It only took mine a finger tap on the silver thingy for them to come see what it was and to try it themselves. The nipples are red and shiny to attract them.
 
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