The Chicks Are Here!!

Today has been a busy day on the farm!! We started the day out with a huge list of things to do. One of the things on the list was to gather all the things we needed for when the baby chicks arrived. We were told that they would arrive between the 28th and the 30th. And they got here today. There was a message on Jeff's cell phone from the post office that they were there. They called at 7am. I didn't even know anyone was at the post office that early.So here are the pictures of our new little additions to the farm...

On the way to the post office, Jeff called to let them know that we were on the way and then in about 5 minutes someone else called from the post office to let us know they were there. Apparently they were making alot of noise haha.
This is the box they were shipped in and they are one day old. Doesn't look very comfortable does it? The edges where the writing say baby chicks.. is creased because I kept lifting it up to peek in at them on the way home with them.

And here they are!! Aren't they the cutest things you've ever seen. Jeff got 2 different breads as you can see, red, black, and yellow. We also got a free exotic chick. You can just see the top of its head in the top right corner wedged between two of the yellow ones.
They are very temperature sensitive at this stage and have to be kept at around 95 degrees. So on the way we put the box in the front floor board with the heat vents going wide open. Needless to say this didn't help my hot flashes at all haha.

Just a closer shot of the babies. We are keeping them in our office and gradually let our animals in to see them so they can get used to them.
We aren't really sure what the red dots on their heads is for. We thought it may be a way to mark them to distinguish between another breed or something.

This is the tub that we are keeping them in. No there is not a problem with the camera-there really is a pink tint to the area. We have a 250 watt red bulb over the tub so they can stay warm. In the bottom of the tub is a few inches of pine shavings with newspaper covering it and some feed spread out on top to get them used to pecking for feed.

Jeff is putting the first chick in her new home. This is also a shot of the tub so you can see what size we were using. The other "jug" in the tub is their one gallon water feeder.

Cozy is one thing but this a little too close for comfort. The waterer and feeder took up alot of room that we weren't figuring into our plans. Plus, we ordered 30 chicks + the free one but we have counted 40 chicks. It's a little difficult to count them because they do not sit still for long. You can see one of the little black one's sitting in the water tray.
When we placed them in the tub we had to dip their beaks in the water so that they would start drinking. They had no trouble at all figuring out what to do with the feed. Yes the water looks a little lemonade. The company we ordered them from sent 2 packets of powder to add to their water for the first week. One is extra electrolytes and the other is for chick shock basically. It helps them get over being mailed and displaced. I also have to add 12 tablespoons of sugar to the water. This will give them extra energy. I thought that sounded like alot. But they seem to be doing ok with it. Actually this waterer in the picture is now almost empty. Jeff just went out to check them and said we would have to refill it before we went to bed.

This is a picture of me after having placed one of the chicks in the tub. I was so scared when I picked up the first one. I thought I was going to hurt it because they are sooo tiny. I was holding one of the little yellow ones and it was pecking my finger nail the whole time.It was so cute.

That little brown thing in my hand is our rare exotic free chick. I look like I'm about to pop from excitement don't I?
Once we got all the chicks into the tub we realized that we were going to have to get another tub. They were entirely too close in there. We had read online that someone used a plastic kiddie pool but the girl at our local farm supply said they would jump out of it. I was skeptical about this until we took the lid off the shipping box because a couple of rambunctious ones jumped out. So at that we decided we would get an identical tub.

This is what their new home looks like all put together. Jeff cut one end of the tub and taped wire screen in its place so that we could get the heat lamp going on it. The bulb was touching the wire so we had to put wood pieces underneath it to hold it up. When Jeff got back from the farm he checked the temp in the tub and it was too hot and had to raise the heat lamp. We are thinking we may have to put the 85 watt bulbs in the lamp instead. We want them to be warm but not so hot enough that it kills them.


They are so cute but I'm sure that after cleaning out the tubs on a daily basis that cuteness will wear off soon enough. All the stuff we read online said every couple of days but that just doesn't seem right to me. I wouldn't want to walk around in chicken poop all day and I really don't think it's healthy for them. So i will be doing alot of tub cleaning.
I will try to blog pictures of them every Monday so you can see their growth progress and what different methods we have to use to keep the little boogers alive.