D'awwwww 🤗 Nothing warms the cockles of the heart like newborn chickens eh? Peep Peep!
Bwa hahahahaha as much as Eddie (above) was complaining about them coming to take over our lives for a month in the house, he was the first to want to hold one, and look at that smile! Cuteness overload, you just can't help but break out into the hugest grin around these lovies. #melting
Started them off with one feeder, soon realized some were getting left out so I put another one in right away as well as another little water container.
I have them in the boot room which is nice and small so heats up really fast. They need 35 degree Celsius for the first week and every week after we drop the heat by 5 degrees.
I'm not using a heat lamp, I let them go through the natural cycles of day and night with the window in there. Instead I opted for radiant heat.
As you can see there is a big heavy lid I have on the crate, just incase someone forgets to close the inner door to the boot room, because...you know... #cats! And also they start flying sooner than you'd guess.
I would never think of harming those precious chicken breasts, thighs, mmmmmmm.... I mean, chicks!
I'll keep them together in this one crate until it looks like they need space, then I will divide them up into two different crates.
The chicks will be living in the house for about a month, or maybe more. What we need is some warm nights, 15 degrees minimum all night, when they are 5 weeks old.
They have their own coop which they will then be moved to. It's separate from our other chickens to stop any spread of disease and also fighting which could result in death of the little chicks, as they don't have a mother to protect them.
This is my first time raising baby laying hens. I've done meat birds twice, so it's pretty similar except for the fact that these birds grow a lot slower so will be in the house for a lot longer.
So far so good.
Day #2 😂 Ask me about my sanity come week 4 hahahaha!