Chick Care

Pick Up

Most of the time we have boxes that are supplied for your day-old chicks trip home. Anything older than about a week, you may need to provide your own carrier to transport them in. You can check with us when you schedule your pick-up appointment on if we have a transport box available for you. It is important to make sure that you are going home immediately after picking up so your chicks can get back under a heat lamp again and stay warm. Please refrain from holding your chicks during the car ride home, as this can stress them out more than necessary. If it's cold outside, make sure you have your heater on in your vehicle. Most of the time, chicks are okay for a short period of time without a heat lamp/source accessible. We do not recommend using a heating pad inside the boxes during transport as there is no way for chicks to cool down if they start to get too hot. If we are providing boxes, usually, we have a small amount of large flake pine shavings available that is put in a thin layer down at the bottom of the box. 

Brooder Set Up

This should be done before you pick up your chicks. There are a wide variety of brooders available for purchase and some neat DIY's that you can do to create your own. The choice is yours as far as what works best for you and your house, but also where the chicks are going to be kept for the first few weeks of life. Basically, you want a place that is draft free, and large enough that chicks can get to the heat source, and away from the heat source. I will say that I generally raise poultry in bulk, and your situation may be different. For the first 1-2 weeks I keep the chicks in a heavy-duty plastic tote. Yes, there are some people out there that say never use plastic totes. This is what I've found works well for my situation.  

Heating

Personally, I do not like heater plates. I do not feel like they generate enough radiant heat, and without experience using them they can be difficult to find the right setting on height to keep chicks warm. I do make sure that the heat lamp is not touching the plastic and is far enough away from it so there isn't an issue. You are welcome to use a thermometer inside your brooder box on the ground, but this isn't really necessary. If you are around your chicks, you can tell if they are hot or cold. If they are all bunched up together, they're cold. If they're spread out, hiding behind the feeders and waters, they may be cold.

General rule of thumb is that each week of a chicks life you can decrease the brooder temperature by 5 degrees. 

Week 1: 95 degrees
Week 2: 90 degrees
Week 3: 85 degrees

Bedding

There's a lot of things you can use as bedding, personally, I have found large flake pine shavings to be the best fit for us. The fine pine shavings get kicked around and can be more difficult to clean up out of the feeders and waterers than the fine. DO NOT use cedar shavings as it is TOXIC to chickens DO NOT use puppy pads. I know this idea sounds grand, but the chicks tiny claws get hung up in the fibers and they have trouble getting around. Chopped straw or shredded newspaper works as well. I don't personally like the newspaper because of the dust. 

Feeders and Waterers

Especially while your chicks are little you want to make sure that you get poultry waterers for them. You want to make sure they have the ability to drink out of it, without being able to climb all the way in the water. You'd be surprised how many chicks may accidentally get knocked into the water by another chickling and either drown or get chilled and die because of getting cold. If the bottom of your waterer is larger than needed, you can always fill it with marbles so the chick can't fall into the water.  While we are talking about feeders and waterers, you want to make sure these are set up about 3/4 of the way away from your heat source. I like to do this because it provides a shady spot for them on the other side of the feeder/waterer where they can really cool off. This helps especially during periods when they are unsupervised.

Feed

We give all of our new hatchlings Grow Gel Plus to add the prebiotics and probitotics into their gut for the first 12 hours after they are pulled from the hatcher. After that we start to transition them onto Purina Medicated Chick Starter. I strongly recommend sticking with the same food choice. Changing a chicks diet on them can wreak havoc on their little body's system. Any change in feed should you choose to go to something else should be done slowly and gradually. What I advise people, is buy a 50lb bag on the Purina Medicated Chick Feed and feed it out over the next couple of months and then transition them over to your layer feed. Honestly, unless you are raising a lot of chicks, a 50lb bag will last you several weeks. About 8-12 weeks old is when I look at transitioning chicks off of the chick starter and onto a more permanent feed. Free choice chick grit should also be offered to babies at all times as well. This will help them digest their food.

Illness & Injury

While even with the best care, illness and injury can always happen. It's good to seek the advice of a professional if you are dealing with something serious. While we are limited from giving advice on treating poultry. I can tell you how I do some things when I encounter an issue. 
Chicks getting trampled: This can happen if you have chicks of different sizes in with each other, or if someone isn't feeling 100%, and sometimes it may just be because someone is tired, and others have a lot of energy. I do not ever put chicks together that are vastly different in sizes for this reason. I also keep a close eye and make sure I do not have too many chicks in one brooder for this reason as well. If I am having chicks getting trampled by each other, I separate them out. I've even put a couple in a separate brooder box while they recover if they're not 100%. You can have one chick picking on others and pecking a sore on someone. If I see this, I remove the injured chick until they are completely healed. Something about the color change on a chick if they have an open wound or skin showing that makes others want to peck them. If someone happens to get too wet, I separate them from the others (still with their own heat source).
Pasty butt: can commonly happen with chicks. Many believe this to be caused by coccidia, however, it isn't the only thing that can cause it. Diet changes, stress, and changes in temperature can also cause this. It is imperative to regularly check your chicks bottom for any fecal build-up. If you start seeing it, you can gently clean the area with a soft baby wipe. You have to make sure they can properly expel waste otherwise they will get backed up and it will lead to death. Sometimes it will resolve in a day, and sometimes it will take a week of care to resolve. You can add additional probiotics into their water, but most often it resolves on its own as long as you keep a close eye on them and keep them cleaned regularly. DO NOT bathe your chicks. 

Transitioning Your Chicks Out of the Brooder

When chicks are about a month to 6 weeks old, they can start coming out of the brooder that they are in. I move mine into a large wire dog kennel as long as they aren't too small to squeeze through the panels. They still have a heat source - but it's further away. It still stays inside unless the day is nice and sunny, and not too breezy. At that time, I will allow the chicks to go outside in the wire kennel to lay in the grass and enjoy the day sunbathing. You need to make sure this isn't done early in the morning. Dew on the ground can easily get your babies wet and chilled before you know it. Ideally, wait until it is mostly dry, or there's a nice sandy spot for them to go onto. You will still need to check in on them regularly. If they're all hunched together it's probably still too cold for them to be outdoors. Chicks cannot be left outside until they are 100% fully feathered out - meaning all of their baby down is gone and replaced by true feathers. Even being fully feathered out, if the night is even a little bit chilly, they need to be inside or in a small coop with a heat source. A good rule of thumb is if you need a jacket to be outside, they probably do too. By 12 weeks of age, most are good to be outside all the time without worry (excluding winter-time seasons). 

Last updated: 3/21/2023