Category Archives: Caring for chicks

Guinea chicks (keats) hatching

My little buff hen has patiently sat on the Guinea eggs for close to 30 days and four keats hatched out yesterday.  They all looked fine when I brought them inside and put them under the heat lamp though two were rather sluggish.  I assumed they were just hatched out and were tired and sleepy like the baby chickens I am use to raising.

I went back an hour or so to check the temperature and they were fine but after four hours or so, two were dead.  I was so sad.  Their perfectly formed bodies just lying there limp.  It was a mystery to me why they died.

Now, when I brought them in and put them on the towel in the bottom of the box, I did notice maybe five or six ants had been on them.  I am wondering if they could have bitten them enough to put poison in their systems.  I know when ants bite me, a get a nasty pimple with white pus.  If I get too many bites at one time, I actually feel sick and run a low grade fever.   My body is a whole lot larger than a chick’s so I can only imagine how bad a baby chick could feel with multiple bites.

As soon as it is daylight, I am going out there to check on the eggs and bring the keats inside if any are hatched.  Maybe I can get them before the ants start moving around.  With chicken feeders filled with food, it is difficult to keep the ants away from the chicken yards.  You would think the chickens would eat the ants.  I guess when the egg hatches and there is material left in the egg shell, it attracts the ants to the nest where the momma hen is sitting on the chicks.  With four hatching at one time, it could be difficult for the momma to dispose of the egg shells.  Sometimes, part of the egg shell is eaten or missing before I realize a chick is hatched out.

Well, I am thinking about getting outside and working on getting my chicken houses ready for cold weather but that is another post so I will end this one now and start that one.

Silkie eggs hatching out today

It is 10am and I have four chicks hatched out so far with two more that have pipped but resting at the present time.  There are two dark chicks, one buff and one white.  Yoo hoo.  Then I went outside and my black Silkie hatched a buff chick and my multi-colored Silkie hatched out a dark colored chick.

Before I went to bed last night, a couple of the eggs in the incubator had already pipped…broken thru the shell enough to breathe. The two eggs below, I actually chipped some extra shell off so the chick could get plenty of air.   It makes it harder for them to zip out of the shell so I may end up helping them out if they aren’t out in a couple hours.  I usually take them out of the egg turner and lay the eggs down but I thought I would try it this way for a change.  It does make it easier for me to tell which eggs have pipped.

I have the four chicks that hatched from the incubator in the bathtub.  I put towels or old t-shirts down on the bottom of the tub since it is so slick.  I am trying to decide whether I want to let the mommas outside that hatched their chicks keep them or put them in the tub with the other four that hatched out today, too.  After recently losing one of my chicks to a snake, I believe, I am not comfortable leaving them outside.   I think snake because that is the only thing that could have gotten into the small 2 inch by 4 inch openings.  I have wood along the bottom that is approximately 18 inches high, too.

I have a number of things I should do today but I am pretty sure I will just be staying home enjoying the baby chicks.  I love to watch them take their first steps…so funny.   It is only a matter of hours and they are up and running around.

Yes, it is a good day today.  Maybe I will spend some time in the kitchen cooking up some foods for the next couple days.   I can make some egg salad, put the beans in water to soak, make a pot of chili and  some spaghetti sauce, and there is a cake that is calling my name.   Some days, I just love being home all by myself just piddling.  Other days, I just have to get out of the house.  Two and a half more moths and my husband will be retired and we will have all day, every day together.  I can hardly believe it.  We are going to have so much fun and get so much accomplished.  I tell him his honey-do list is growing every day.  He just smiles.

Finally, a buff-colored Silkie chick

I have been putting the eggs from my buff-colored hens under any hen that is broody and not getting any chicks.  Well, I had one chick hatch out yesterday and I am pretty sure she looks like she will be buff-colored.  It is sometimes hard to tell when they are first hatched out.  I realized a couple days ago that one of the chicks hatched out in April is actually going to be buff-colored, too.  I am thrilled.

Lacy is a white Silkie that I got back in December, along with her week old chick.  Her baby chick stuck by her for months and is now full grown and laying eggs herself.  Lacy B (baby) is her name.

Lacy has gone broody twice since December and hatched out chicks for me.  She still has five more eggs under her but none hatched out today.  I put them under her at various times for about a week so I don’t know if more will hatch or not.  Hope so.

Today, I was moving the chicks around and they were not happy about it.  They were making all kinds of noises and the Light Blue Silkie rooster decided to attack me.  He jumped at my legs.  I had on shorts so I got a slight scratch on my leg.  That was the first time I have ever seen any aggression from the roosters.  The momma’s get very aggravated when I try to look under them to see if the eggs have hatched or if I come near their newly hatched chicks but this was a first for me.   Then the Black or Grey Silkie rooster (didn’t really see which one as I had my hands full just trying to carry the three chicks) decided to try to jump me a few minutes later when I was moving more chickens.

I was glad I decided to move the chicks because there were so many ants in the one yard.  The smaller chicks are still eating starter food and they get it everywhere so it has attracted a lot of ants.  Usually before I put chickens in a small yard, I rake it really good to get any old poop out of it.  Sometimes I hose the area down, too.  After it is dry, I sprinkle ant killer granules LIGHTLY in the area.  I make sure there is not any piles of ant granules.  Sometimes I even rake it a little more just so its not so obvious to the chickens.  Then I spread hay on the ground lightly.   This seems to be working for me.  I just make sure there is plenty of food and water for them so they don’t have to start scratching the ground to look for food for awhile.

Well, the chicks are all settled down in their new yards but I still have 7 chicks in my second tub.  They are barely one week old and I don’t want to put them outside yet.   I will get the area that I cleaned out today ready for them in the near future.  Fortunately, the 4×8 cage is moveable so it will be a little less work.

I don’t know how many ant bites I got today.  I am not allergic to the bites but I have noticed that if I get too many at one time, I don’t feel real well.  I bet I got fifteen or twenty today.  Dang it.  I had to trim my trees in my chicken yards, too because every time I went under them or I brushed against one, I ended up with an ant on my blouse or arms.  They must be after me.  I do run around the yard putting ant killer granules out when my chickens are not free ranging so they must have spread the word.  lol

So my count now is 121 chickens.  I really am going to sell some in the near future.  I was out there looking closely at them today, determining hens and roosters.  I know I have two extra black Silkie roosters.  I have the cutest little grey Silkie…I will add a picture tomorrow if I can.  It grey and has white under it’s neck area and it is so fat and fluffy looking.

I was talking to my husband out in the chicken yard commenting on how this one is so cute and how much I like that one.  My husband said, “So which one don’t you like?”  He knew my answer.  NONE.  Though I do get aggravated when one chicken seems to be picking on another one.

More chicks…. for me!!!!!

I sold some fertilized Americuana eggs to a lady about six months or so and she called me today.  She said she had hatched out some eggs for a friend and had extra that she didn’t want.  The chicks were one week to two weeks old and there are thirteen.  And she gave them to me.  Hopefully, most of them are hens.

So I have another Barred Rock chick, five Americuana and 7 mixed Rhode Island Red/Buff Orphington.  I just love chicks.  I had to put them in my bathtub for now.  I segregate them for a few days just to make sure they are healthy before I put them around my healthy chicks/chickens.

I was sad to lose one of my Silkie roosters the other day.  He was just lying in the chicken house dead…I saw nothing to determine why he died.  I was thinking maybe the roosters got in a fight and he lost but there is no sign of blood or damage to his body.  Strange.  Occasionally, I find a chicken dead.  I guess there could have been something wrong with his internal organs.  Who knows?

So, now I have 120 chickens.  All these babies will someday grow up and I will have bunches of eggs every day.  Actually, as they get a little older I can see which ones I need to get rid of to keep my flock proportioned.   I only need one rooster for every 8 or so hens.  I know I need to get rid of two black Silkie roosters because there are three and I have only three or four hens that are black.

I can’t wait until the cooler weather so I can spend more time outdoors.  It is just so dang hot in Florida right now.  With my husband retiring soon, I am thinking about moving closer to my family back in NC.  Or maybe to the mountains in Tennessee.  I guess then I will have a new set of problems with my chickens.  I will have to build better houses that will keep my chickens warm during the winter.   If I move closer to my grand children, maybe I won’t need any chickens to mother.  lol

Hatching chicks is addictive

OMG, I love waking up in the morning to hear little peeping coming from my incubator.

Yesterday morning, I heard peeping and found a black little Silkie chick standing  in the incubator.  It is amazing to me that a chick can peck its way out of the shell and be walking around the next morning.  I always check the eggs just before I go to bed and there wasn’t even a chip or crack in any of the eggs.

Then this morning, I heard peeping again.  Much to my delight, two baby chicks.  The dark one was up and trying to walk and was actually pretty dry looking.  The little grey one was still trying to get up on its feet and still a little damp looking.  They fluff out so quickly.   The dark one I put into the bath tub with the other four chicks that have hatched out in the last week or so.  The little grey one I will keep under a heat lamp by itself for a few more hours.  She just looks like she wants to sleep.

I call all my chicks “she” from the time they are hatched.  I like to think I am speaking it into existence.  Hens are easier to sell and of course, there is the whole egg thing.  Not much production from the rooster.  As my husband so eloquently put it,” the hens lay the eggs and the roosters lay the hens. ” So unless you want fertilized eggs, there isn’t much use for the rooster.  And yes, the chickens do lay eggs without a rooster.

I do feel the rooster protects the hens.  My neighbor said there was a stray cat in my yard the other day looking like he wanted chicken for dinner.  He said the rooster charged the cat a number of times and the cat left the premises.  I wish I could have seen that.

The rooster is also frequently more colorful than the hen and of course, who doesn’t love the sound of a rooster at 5am.  lol

If you look at the website backyardchickens.com you will see I am not the only person addicted to chickens or hatching  out chicks.  That website has been a wealth of knowledge for me.

Well, I have three more eggs in my incubator that should hatch in the next day or so and my second incubator is loaded down with eggs but they won’t start hatching until the end of the month.  Oh yeah, don’t wash your eggs if you want to hatch them.  There is this protective “boom” on the egg that you don’t want to wash away.

Leah, a fellow chicken raiser, showed me a great system for hatching eggs.  She uses two incubators.  One incubator has the egg turner in it and the other does not.

I write the date I put the egg into the incubator and I know 21 days later I will have a chick if all goes well.   I remove the eggs as each egg reaches the 18th day and put it into the second incubator to hatch.  You just lie the egg down and leave it to hatch now.

Don’t forget to set the incubator up 24 to 48 hours ahead of your date you intend to put eggs in it.  You need to get your temperature and humidity correct before adding eggs.  So, I don’t get the second incubator ready until day 16.  That gives me two days to make sure the incubator is working correctly.  And please go buy a hydrogrometer (I think that is what it is called) to check your humidity and temp.  You can see it in the next picture.  I got mine at Walmart for about 6 bucks, I think.

So let’s say its day 18, and four of the eggs need to go into the second incubator.  You put them in the second incubator and they will hatch there in three days.  The next day, you have three eggs that need to go into the second incubator.  QUICKLY, open the incubator and put the eggs in.  I say quickly because once the eggs reach the 18th day, they should go into “lock down.”  That means you don’t turn the eggs and you normally would not open the lid.

Because I do not get forty eggs in one day, I use this system and it works fine for me.  Just don’t have the second incubator open any longer than you must.   You might have to add more water and you need to add more eggs as the 18th day arrives.

Once the egg hatches and the chick emerges, leave her in there.  Let her dry some and get her walking legs though wobbly they will be.  I have read you leave them in the incubator after hatched for 24 hours.  Doesn’t happen for me.  I am so excited.  Again, I quickly grab the baby chick and the shell and remove them to be put under a heat lamp with the temperature already at 100 degrees.  I have a themometer lying in the bed where the new chick is will be so I am sure the temp is not too hot or too cold.

This box is about a 10×10 inch with a folded t-shirt in it.  She will stay in it until I see she is walking around and pretty much fluffed out…usually a matter of hours.   The heat lamp is red.  This is the little grey chick hatched this morning.

I use stained t-shirts or old towels for the bedding.   Of course, I have washed them and they are clean.  I think the babies can get better footing on the t-shirts and get up and going faster.  I have seen other people use plastic containers with wood shavings.  Slippery to me and I think I read you shouldn’t use wood shavings.  Chicks eat anything.

These are chicks in the bath tub under the red heat lamp.  Chicks needs to have 100 degree temperature for the first two weeks.  The little chick at the bottom of the picture  is the dark chick that hatched out this morning.

Your chicks will not need food or water for three days but I always have it in the chick’s yard/tub/box waiting for them to get the urge.  The yellow yoke was the baby’s food and water and it was absorbed into the chick thru the rectum area.  That is what keeps them satisfied for a couple days.  That is why chicken wholesalers can send baby chicks thru the mail when they are one day old.

I hope the things I tell you are informative.  I really enjoy my chickens as you can probably tell.  It really gives me something to look forward to each morning after I get my hubby off to work.  As soon as it is daylight, I am outside feeding my chickens and seeing that all of them made it thru the night.  I have a couple of broody hens right now and I soon will be checking them daily to see if any new baby chicks have hatched.

My chicken yard looks rather red-neck right now but I have lots of plans to make my chicken yard/houses look like a nice neighborhood.  I am going to put a privacy fence around their yard, too.  It is fun for me to make drawings and make plans for the future for their surroundings.

Maybe it is the motherly side of me or the creative side of me or the control freak part of me that makes me enjoy this life so much.  I am looking forward to the fall when we will prepare our soil for our first garden, if all goes well.  Vegetable seeds are so cheap and any extra food we grow and don’t eat will go to our relatives first and then the chickens.

This is indeed, a quiet and peaceable life.  I love it.