Chickie Babies Adventures

As we ready ourselves for a new bunch of chicks, we are enjoying our 8-week old chicks. If they were meat birds, they would be halfway to butchering size. Now when you open the coop to check their water and feed, they try to escape. Not really escape as much as flying to see who can get to you first. When you have fourteen little gals all vying for your attention at once, it can get a little harried.

Upon opening half the outside access door, there's a flurry of activity from the hens. Dozens of little birds wings from the roosts and bottom of the coop all heading towards you at once. I'll have baby hens on tp of my head, shoulders, and arms in an instant. I'll quickly catch them and place them back in the coop because usually there is a dog or cat in close proximity.   I'd rather them not be traumatized by ending up in one of our other critter's mouths. I know my cats won't kill them, but I'm not so sure about the other critters. Can you see me trying to chase down Dervish or the dogs after they catch one? I think I'll pass.

The point is, we've trained our new hens to trust us and it started from day one on our homestead. They are a friendly bunch now. They look at Mel as the main mama. I'm their secondary mama.Either way, they are glad to see us and be loved on by us. There is an exception. One Barred Rock chick, loves her some Mel and only Mel. When I reach out to pet her, she lets me know in short order that I'm not allowed to by pecking my hand hard ( just short of drawing blood) in rapid succession. No, we won't be naming these new chicks or any subsequent chicks in Mel's business venture. They'll just be too many of them even if they all have distinctive characteristics.

I still haven't figured out just how we managed a standard silkie chick in our assortment. There's no mistaking the feathers, black skin, nor dark feet. She's a Silkie. Meyers doesn't hatch standard Silkies and she's too big for a bantam. I had thought maybe she was a Polish, but she's lacking in the tufted head feathers, sand there is no solid white in Meyer's breeding assortment. Somebody messed up somewhere. But we're not upset by it. Silkies are known to be very broody. So when we start the chicken farm with breed specific hens and roosters, she can hatch them out and raise them just like Brody and Black Butt. It'll be less work for us to do. Although there won't be the big hatch rates as with the incubator. But still, five to ten babies we won't have to care for is a plus. The mama raised chicks aren't as friendly as the ones we brood and raise.

Now that it hasn't rained in two days straight, it's the ideal time to open the coop door and let the babies out into a huge world (the 12'x26' run).`Besides, their coop needs to be cleaned out and new straw spread out. They've made a fairly large mess in there. The first challenge they face is the 2 1/2' ramp to get to the ground. The run is covered by straw and dried leaves. It takes a while for the most bold chicks to even step out of the coop. We are prepared for this and brought two chairs into the run for us to sit and wait. In a matter of a couple of hours, all the chicks are outside in the run. They are doing their own thing in clusters while we scrap the soiled bedding out of their coop and put fresh bedding down. We decided not to do the deep bedding methods for more comost for the garden.

Just before dusk, we go back out to the run and help wayward chicks back into the coop for the night. We will have to do this for several nights until they all learn when roosting time is.

Meanwhile, we'll muck out the bunny/chicken barn. We'll be converting this to raise even more chickens in and have a "maternity ward"/ toddler area for our broody girls to raise their young. It'll be  a safe place to grow out mama raised chickens. It's already set up for really young chicks. We put chicken wire up 3' to keep the rabbits in and it will work for the chicks too.

We'll be building a partitioning wall to separate the rabbits and chickens within the bunny/chicken hoop barn. We've been thinking about doing it for a while now. a wired pallet wall halfway up will work with a door between the rabbit and chicken area so I won't have to walk around the building. It will also help support the hoop roof that we are currently using 2x4x10s bracing.

So changes for the better are happening around our homestead. The baby chicks and upcoming baby chicks are causing us to rethink what we already have in place to repurpose for cheaper alternatives as Mel grows her business. And, the adventures are just beginning.

Y'all have a blessed day!

Cockeyed Jo