Baby Chicks!

Well it is certainly Spring here at Palazzo Rospo. Last Thursday we had kittens and today we have chicks. I find it SO exciting.

For the first time in the two years we've been keeping chickens, we had a hen go broody. For a couple of nights in a row, when I locked up the chickens at night, she was in the nest box (plastic cat litter-box, the kind with a lid) rather than on the roost. In the morning, though, she'd get up and run grab some food along with the rest of her flock. Then on about the third day she didn't run grab food. She sat in that nest box and for three weeks I NEVER saw her leave it.

This morning when I went to give the chickens their food and fresh water, there was a dead chick on the floor of the chicken coop. I expect it had hatched and gotten out of the nest box but been unable to get back in, so it got chilled and died.

I put the nest box, with hen and eggs in it, in the brooder box I made for brooding incubated chicks. I put a nice thick fluffy layer of wood chips down and built a little ramp of wood chips going up to the nest box entrance so if any chicks do get out, hopefully they'll be able to get back in.


I also put the chick waterer and feeder in the brooder box, and turned on the heat lamp in the corner opposite the nest box. This way the chicks have something to eat and drink (though they'll be okay for about three days with no food or water), and if they can't get in the nest box or don't want to, they can hang out under the heat lamp. That's the way I raise my incubated chicks and they do great.


I don't know how many chicks have hatched. I counted seven (plus the dead one) but they're all hanging out in the nest box. I don't even know how many eggs she was sitting on. She's doing a great job. I can't wait to see them all running around being busy little chick babies. The hen growled at me when I took these pictures. I'd never heard a hen growl before.