Baby Chicks for Easter

So I had to make a run into town to get some more wood post for my fences and why I was there I picked up 17 Cornish chicks. Over the last few years we have ended up losing some of our chickens to predators and have eaten many more of them so we are just about out of chickens. We wanted to start this season with a couple dozen new Rhode Island ladies for eggs but since this was what was available to me today we went ahead and got them. I just wanted to start with my new layers since they take longer to get going then the meat breeds but since we like chicken these will do just fine and in a couple weeks I will pick up some laying hens, ducks and even maybe a few turkeys this year. After I get my new hens up to age I will break out the incubators and start hatching our own for eating and selling. Since I already have all these things from previous use I might as well put them to work again.

We have a nice commercial brooder for chicks but it takes up so much space and I have lots of these aquariums from when I use to breed snakes and lizards. The 55 gal tanks actually work just as well as the brooders do and I have shelves to double stack them and save floor space. I also decided to go with the compressed wood pellets they sell for horses as bedding for them since this stuff works great for a carbon source when making compost and will be a nice addition to my composters after the chicks are done with it.

I will be moving these into my older rabbit cages that we don't use for rabbits anymore and then from there into the padlocks with the goats and pigs and then they will make it into the freezer. I hope everyone else has as much fun raising their livestock as we do.