Getting Your Ducks in a Row for Raising Baby Chicks: Eight Questions and Answers

The expression "taking them under your wing” is one of about a million idiomatic phrases that originated with poultry keeping.  I’m sure you know what it means and I’m willing to bet that you’ve used the phrase yourself more than once.  But just in case you’ve never heard the expression, it means to nurture and protect those who are inexperienced, young, or in need of protection—just as mother hen nurtures and protects her baby chicks and gathers them under her protective wing.  When you adopt baby chicks, you’re taking these small, helpless, peeping balls of fluff under your wing.  It’s a big responsibility, and if you’ve never done it before, you should make sure you understand the list of basics before you undertake this big venture.  If you have done it before, it’s good to pull out that list and review it just to make sure you have all your ducks in a row (I’m mixing metaphors here, but it does present an interesting mental image!).  Raising baby chicks is not hard, after all, but there are a few things you have to consider and a few things you need to do right. 

I'll be publishing this post on June 5, and shortly after I post it, my wife, Kathy, and I will get in the car and set off on our quest for baby chicks.  If you’re reading it the day I post it, you can imagine us somewhere on I-35 headed south from Minnesota to Webster City, Iowa to pick up chicks at the Murray McMurray Hatchery.  Or maybe we’re on the way home and I’m holding a box of peeping fluff balls on my lap.  You can be sure that getting these babies was not a spontaneous decision.  What follows is a list of the questions I've asked myself and the answers I've come up with before getting these babies. I think these questions and answers will be useful to you if you're considering getting chicks for the first time, or if you're adding to your existing flock. There’s lots of useful information on the web about caring for baby chicks, and every time I’ve gotten chicks I’ve taken the time beforehand to sample from the collective knowledge of all those people who have raised chicks and written about it.  I’m including a lot of links to all those folks in this post.  It takes a village, don’t you know, to raise a chick. 

1 - Do I want chickens?  This is the obvious first thing you consider. If you’ve thought about owning chickens, you probably already realize that becoming a chicken owner will put you at the forefront of the local/sustainable food movement.  You’ll be producing food right in your own backyard!  If you already produce food in your backyard with a garden, chickens are a natural complement to that garden—the chickens will happily devour any leftover vegetable scraps and weeds you give them and all that composted chicken manure will make for some very happy garden plants!  Also, any chickens you keep will, without a doubt, be better treated and happier than the majority of the hens laying the eggs you find at the grocery store.  So, does it make you happy to imagine a small flock of hens clucking contentedly in your backyard?  If you immediately answer “yes” to that question, you’ve jumped the first hurdle!  That was the easy one!  Of course if you already have chickens the question becomes, “Do I want more, chickens?”  The answer to that question is always “yes”, naturally.

Baby Chicks! Coming Soon To a Coop Near You!

Baby chicks and eggs have been a symbol of spring since ancient times – perhaps all the way back to the time when chickens were first domesticated.  They also have been important symbols in Christianity from the times of the early church.  The egg symbolizes the rock tomb where Christ’s body was laid and the hatching chick symbolizes His resurrection.

So it is highly appropriate that baby chick day here at the Hipster Hen Ranch will be Easter Sunday. The chick nursery is set up and ready to go and Courtney and I are both eagerly awaiting the soon-to-arrive babies.

The Chick Nursery

Some specifics on the nursery:

Chick water font filled with electrolyte solution:  The small water font is designed for babies.  The electrolytes are because the chicks may be stressed.  They are traveling from Eastern Wisconsin to Minnesota over the course of a day during the very first day of their lives.  While car travel will not be as stressful as being plunked into a box and sent through the mail, it is still  more taxing than just hanging around the spot they are hatched.

Baby chick crumbles:  Eventually Courtney will take her brood outside where they’ll learn about bugs, seeds, and scratching in the dirt, but for now they will be eating crumbles designed specifically for baby chicks by our friends at Purina.

Paper Towels:  I always start babies on paper towels.  I don’t recommend newspapers since they are too slippery.  Many people use pine shavings and while I'll switch to that when the chicks are older, I like to start with paper towels.  The chicks will instinctively scratch and peck at the floor from the get-go, and eating pine shavings is not particularly healthy for babies.  I scatter crumbles all over the floor and they will have a good time pecking at those – and the crumbles will be much easier to find on paper towels than they would if they were all mixed up with pine shavings.  Paper towels are handy because as they become soiled, I can just layer more towels over the top.  In a few weeks, when the chicks are ready for pine shavings, I can just roll up the whole mass of paper towels and put them in the compost pile.

Heat lamp:  The lamp is hanging high in the air and will provide supplemental heat.  When the chicks are cold, or want to sleep, they’ll find a nice warm spot under Courtney’s wing - their main heat source.  And while it isn't a thought I like to dwell on, there’s the possibility that Courtney will not accept these babies.  If that were to occur, I would move the heat lamp lower it would be the primary heat source.

Mama hen:  I have great faith in this sweet little bird.  She’s been patiently sitting on golf balls for weeks!

The Ever-Patient Courtney

Building a Chick Nursery

Well, I'm making progress on building the chicken coop in the pole barn but it is rapidly becoming obvious that it won't be done by the time the babies show up in June.  On to plan B:  I'm converting my wood shed to a brooder house for the babies and they can actually live there for most of the summer which will take the pressure off for getting the coop finished.

Easy steps for turning the woodshed into a brooder house (1)  Remove firewood left over from the winter. (2)  Sweep out dirt and sawdust.  (3)  Hang a couple of heat lamps.  (4)  Add kiddie pool (Now I know why I saved the old kiddie pool all these years!) (5) Cover bottom of kiddie pool with paper towels (The experts recommend paper towels for bedding rather than pine shavings or straw for tiny babies.  As the paper towels become soiled you can continue to put down more layers and when they've outgrown the towels, you can just roll them all up and throw them away in one fell swoop!) (6) Chick water fonts and feeders.

The heat lamps are on adjustable chains and can be moved up and down depending on the ambient temperature and the age of the chicks.  As the chicks get older I can get rid of the kiddie pool, put pine shavings on the floor and they can have complete run of the 10 x 10 building.

 I built these sliding screen doors out of hardware cloth and 1 x 4's so I can have the doors open for ventilation once the weather warms up.

I built a rather haphazard chicken run out of some leftover fencing for the chicks to go outside when they're old enough.  They will outgrow this enclosure, but hopefully by that time I'll have the real coop and chicken run ready to go!