Adventures with Chicks (pt. 9)

Instead of waiting a whole week before letting them out with the girls, I decided to only wait 5 days based on the behaviour of the chicks and the established flock. There didn't seem to be any sort of animosity in the group, so I let them out after spreading out a whole box full of produce goodies for them. I made sure to scatter across the whole run so everyone could snack without being forced near the other chickens, then I put the chicks in.

There were squabbles, but nothing constant. Most of the time the hens were just wanting to eat. Sometimes even eating near the chicks. Occasionally a charge at the chicks, but not a full-on attack.



There have been a few times when the hens attacked a chick, pulling a feather out here or there, but that was it. They didn't carry on, it was always a quick squabble. This is quite the opposite of when we introduced our roo to them, as they would corner him and just pick on him constantly until I intervened. This is just attempts to establish pecking order.

I can't tell you how much of a relief it was to see them react this way! The new girls stick to their little group, but the rooster is the one that was nice to them straight away. He would even break up a pecking-order squabble from time to time.

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for the content of this post. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Adventures with Chicks (Pt. 8)

At 12 weeks of age, the chicks that we still had (4 of them were rehomed) found their cage set up in the enclosed section of our coop (just like our rooster was set up when he was first introduced to the girls). While we set that up, the kids watched the chicks play in the baby-gated area, and then loved on them a bit.

We put up a section of plastic on the western side of the coop that was directly behind their cage to help protect from the elements (eventually it has to rain, right?), and a bit of cardboard on the one side to help them be able to hide from the girls if they felt nervous before the established flock was let out in the morning.

I have let the established flock out to free-range and opened up the door for the chicks to explore, but they don't want to venture too far away yet. Soon they will be integrated with the rest of the flock! They aren't really looking like chicks anymore, though. They look so grown up!

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for the content of this post. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Adventures with chicks (pt. 7)

At 8 weeks old, the chickens are really coming into their own! They have enjoyed a few treats like some fresh plants, dried bugs, and a few pieces of fresh fruit scraps.

Marshmallow (white cochin) and our unnamed Bantam Partridge Silkie + photobomb from our Blue(?) chick

Black Australorp

I just dropped some wild strawberries in for them, and the OE is more interested in making sure she's in the picture

Our most curious chick is the little Barred Rock

This pretty girl was just getting ready to stretch out her wing (which is why it looks a bit funny)

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for the content of this post. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Adventures with chicks (pt. 6)

One day before turning 7 weeks old, our chicks had to move house again. I feel bad that they don't have the ability to fly up on the side of the baby gate to roost anymore, but as they get bigger they create more dust. I prefer not to have my house smell like a chicken coop, so they relocated to the garage.

All 9 of the chicks in their new home

We have a really large metal dog crate that they got relocated to, and a large (yet small) branch was fed through the bars in the back section to allow for them to still roost if they want. Often times they still prefer to just plop together in the straw to sleep.

Of course, now our garage smells like chickens, but that is much better than a room inside. We often open our garage door and the back door to the garage to let the air circulate through to help cut down on smell, but it is going to smell a bit like chicken until we move them outside.

Though I feel bad for making them fully enclosed (versus an open top like they had) they are a bit more at ease when the kids come near them because the kids can't just reach down and try to grab them. I also feel bad about the size, wishing it was so much larger so they can roam far and wide, but I keep reminding myself it's only temporary, and that they have it much better than a conventional laying hen that is kept in battery cages that are so small they can't even stand up and can just poke their head out to eat/drink. At least my chicks have enough room that they can literally run around, fly about a bit, and have space to roost.

You can see the branch to roost on if you look at the left side of the picture

Soon I'll have to find homes for a few of these girls, as we don't have room to add 9 more chickens to our coop. Well, going back to the battery cages bit, we technically do have room, but we would rather not crowd our flock too much.

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for the content of this post. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own. 

Adventures with chicks (pt. 5)

Our chicks are 6 weeks old and officially have feathers! They are also significantly harder to keep still for pictures, so I had to resort to holding the birds in front of me and snapping a picture. If their feet touched something, they would use it to their advantage and push off and sneak away. Without my friend over this time, my helpers were Bobble and Squiggle... erm... "helpers". 

Black Australorp, and the calmest chicken at the moment. She let me take this picture with minimal fuss.

 Above are the two EEs. Bobble's is on the left, and I'm holding the other one on the right.

We finally figured out that this is a Bantam Partridge Cochin. I'm loving this little one! She's so... different!

This barred rock is fiesty, and is making a run for it as the picture is being taken.

Still not 100% on this gorgeous chick, but current guess is Blue Orpington or Blue Andalusian

We have come to the conclusion that this lovely blue is actually an Olive Egger.. mostly because of her cheeks (see second picture below)

Squiggle's white cochin is on the left (note the black leg band), and the other has now grown in all white feathers (right). Good thing we put a band on them!

The chicks also had their first taste of treats today, as we gave them some dried mealworms after their (forced) photoshoot.

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for the content of this post. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Adventures with chicks (pt. 4)

At 3 weeks and 3 days, the chicks have definitely given a better idea of what they will look like as they get older. They also quickly were growing out of their new container. We planned a similar set up as we had for our injured hen (and also that we used for our roo when we first got him), except significantly more straw for snuggling against and a heat lamp.

I had a friend over, (the person that introduced me to keeping chickens, actually!) and she helped me put a little band around the legs of a couple of the chicks.

Our little bantam is growing some feathers in and looking less like a chipmunk!

The barred rock is starting to show her barring instead of sporting all black with a white dot on the back of her head.

Still pretty certain this is a black australorp, and we are intending on keeping her.

Our two blues wouldn't hold still for the picture, but my friend did her best to get them to at least show their face for the camera. 

The feathers are coming in on the supposed buff cochin, and they are white! When I realized these two will likely be identical, we quickly banded the one that Squiggle wanted as her own chick so we could tell them apart.

The two easter egger (EE) chicks. The one on the right is Bobbles, and we banded her just in case they started to look more like each other like what happened with Squiggle's chick.

As the chicks grow, they are getting more spirited. By that, I mean they are more active and when I reach for them and they will either loudly run from me, or run up and peck at my wedding band.

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for the content of this post. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Adventures with chicks (pt. 3)

At two weeks of age, they looked much different!

Many more feathers, and much larger, too. We upgraded their container to something longer (They still have a heat lamp, of course!) and gave them a bigger food bowl and an actual watering container.

I took a picture of each chick individually at 2w and 2d:

Bobble's EE (pic to left is another EE)

 The two above are both going to be blue or lavender of some sort. The one on the right has feathers on the legs, too.

Above left we don't really know what she is. I was guessing Black Australorp at first, but I really don't know. The above right is a Barred Rock chick, and she will look just like our girls that we already have.

The one above on the left is Squiggle's chick. We are guessing she is a white cochin. I thought the one on the right would be a buff cochin due to colouration, but the feathers are coming in white... so maybe we got two white cochin chicks?

 

This last one is our accidental bantam. This chick is half the size of the others, and we have no idea what breed it might be. The bantam chicks are straight run (not sexed), so we don't know the gender, either. (S)he has a poof on their head, but not big enough to be a Polish chick, and they have five toes. Our best guess is maybe a Bantam Houdan?

It's crazy how much they change in such a short time frame!

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for the content of this post. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Adventures with chicks (pt. 2)

The chicks grow really quickly, so I try to take pictures often of them.

They hatched on April 18th, and here they were at one day old:

Two days old:

and at four days old, feathers are very visible on some of them:

Wing feathers are coming in!

Tiny little tail feathers and wing feathers!

They have been pretty active so far, and love to run around and poop in their water. It's a lot easier than I thought it would be to raise chicks. I have to change the water frequently due to how quickly it becomes gross, but for the first week and a half I just had a bowl with large rocks in with them so they couldn't drown in the water. As they grew bigger, I removed the rocks, intending to upgrade to a bigger watering container soon.

They kicked their food out of the bowl a lot, so replacing their food happened about 3x a day. I didn't have a huge food bowl, though, so it wasn't that big of a deal.

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for the content of this post. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own.

Adventures with Chicks (pt. 1)

With the loss of our layer, we decided we would purchase baby chicks. We only needed one hen, but chicks need companionship. Chicks also might grow up to have unpleasant temperaments. Due to this, we actually purchased not just a few, but nine baby chicks!

On the way home from the hatchery (super bright light outside, too!)

Bobble wanted a hen that would lay blue or green eggs (an easter egger [EE]), Squiggle wanted a bird that would be all-white, and I wanted a blue bird (blue or lavender are really a pretty gray in the chicken world). This was going to be challenging since the birds were all together, unlabeled at the hatchery!

All but one of our new chicks (the missing one was drinking water)

I read up on the chick breeds the hatchery had available at some point during the year, and studied the chicks that would grow to be what the kids wanted. I am pretty confident we succeeded in getting all the requirements met! Bobble's EE can be seen in the bottom right of the above picture.

Our blue/lavender chicks

Our white chicks (possible buff on the right)

Disclaimer: Thoughts of Fluff is responsible for all content of this post. All opinions are my own and may differ from those of your own. All chicks were purchased by me.