| Raising Chicks..(How I do it!) |
| Hello everyone, and welcome to the page! I am doing this page to show people my way of raising chicks. I started it out has a way to make money, being a single mom, I needed to make some extra money..but then it turned into a hobby for me and my youngest son. We did not have a lot of money for building material and all...so we scraped together what we had and what we could get for free, and we started out to see what we could do. First I thought how..where can I get a cage for keeping the new chicks in...well I had a clear tote I was not using, so this is where the newly hatched chickens went first. I live in Texas and it's really hot here, so I didnt & still don't use a heat lamp/source. I know every seems to think it's a have too. But I never did/have. I placed the chicks in the tote with chick starter that has Amprolium in it. It's an aid in prevention of coccidiosis. Which is deadly to chicks. And the waterer that has fresh water that I add vitamins & Electrolytes in it. It's a nutritional supplement for poultry. I also put down cheap paper towel in the tote so the chicks don't slip and hurt their feet/legs are self. I keep them in here about 2 weeks depending on the breed. Then they go outside to pen #2, whick has the smallest rabbit wire/hardware cloth wire that I know of. I give them the same feed and water as before. (Then pen was given to me) They stay here until they are fully feathered and bigger..for about 2-3 weeks. Then I put them in pen #3 which is a double size rabbit hutch, that a friend gave me after she stopped raising rabbits. I still feed them the same feed and water as from the start. If rain is in the forcast I cover the pens with a old tarp. Well this was the last pen I had. But it was getting full and the chicks were still to young to put into the main pen. Well being a single mom, and having a teen son here and neither knowing anything about building/carpentry, we thought maybe it would be worth a try. So, we gathers lumber, wire, and all we thought we would need, and we built a A-frame pen for the chicks to live in. We covered it with a small tarp at one end, added the feeder and water. Still the same food and water with the added supplyments. So now we had pen #4. And we put this pen inside the main pen so the chickens could see the chicks and the chicks saw them. They will live here until they are set loose to the main pen. I don't have an incubator besides my Silkie Hens, I have had 100 + chicks hatch and have not lost any of them due to health problems. YIPPIE!! *grin* So you see you don't have to have fancy pens and all that to have some chicks/chickens. For the longest time I didn't even have a hen house/coop. They were just in pens sectioned off my old crate sides that I covered with wire. No tops on them and they were about 4 feet high is all. And for a place for them to go into when raining was old covers off of A/c window units. And for a roosting spot I put one of the long crate sides against a tree and they roost on it. I am now building some coops that I saw posted with the how to, and getting things ready for winter. We don't have very bad winters here and only see a little snow about every 8-10 years is all. I will be taking pictures soon of all the pens and posting them here so people can see you can have chicks/chickens with out a big cost! I did it, so I know it can be done. Don't need fancy stuff to have wonderful chicks/chickens. Sandi aka chickgal_tx |
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