Placing baby chicks on the first day

M8 gas brooder - top class heater!

When your chicks arrive for placement they will come in cardboard chick crates or plastic chick crates. The day old chicks will need to be placed in a pre-warmed poultry house – and that means that you have been heating the chicken house for the last 24 hours. The shavings must be at the right temperature. The baby chicks will most likely be dehydrated – and you will need to give them water first. Once the are happily under your gas heater, and they have taken on water you can give them food.

Plastic chick tray

Baby chickens learn to eat from mommy hen – and now that they have come into the world without mommy hen you are going to have to take on that role. If they are not drinking then you need to show them where the water is and get a drop or 2 down their throats – you will only need to show a couple of baby chicks and the rest will copy. Your chick founts or bell drinkers should be right on the floor so that the chickens can reach.

Now for food – before your chicks arrived you should have enclosed a small area at one end of the chicken house with a gas brooder or electric radiant heater above. Place some news paper on top of the shavings and spread a handful of chick feed on the news paper. When you want the chicks to eat – scratch and rustle the pellets on the news paper – chicks are very inquisitive and will come and see what the noise is about. They will scratch and begin to eat.

For the first week at least the baby chickens should be eating from chick trays – not from tube feeders or chain feeders. So – if you are moaning “my chicks won’t eat” – you now know how to spark them - there are other reasons like health etc. – but the main reason on day one – they need water before they can eat – and that they do not know how. Cardboard chick boxes and chicken crates are available on request – minimum order of 300 units. The cardboard chicken crate has 4 divisions inside to keep the chick from suffocating each other.