Where Does Chicken Come From?

No, the stork doesn’t bring baby chicks to farms, and they aren’t found under cabbage leaves.  The United State Postal Service gets them to us safe and sound. These chicks came all the way from Iowa in just one day in these big boxes.  There are 300 chicks snuggled in here all toasty warm and safe. I think it’s a heck of a deal that these little darlings can get mailed all that way to us for just under $20.

When Maisie sees and hears -they make a heckuva racket peep, peep, peeping away! - the new chicks come, she gets so very excited. For some reason, she just loves them. She checks them out very carefully and will sleep by their brooder house, too.  She never shows any aggression towards them. 

We put them in our little brooder house and give them each a drink as they go into their new home. They are kept out of drafts, and under hear lamps while they are still so tender. 

 They will get full feed for the first few days, after which we must make sure to remove their feed at night.  If we don’t they will grow too fast and  have heart attacks. 

After they have grown their feathers, and if the weather is accommodating, we’ll put them into the chicken tractors so they can be out in the fresh air and green grass. But for now they need a lot of coddling. "What's a chicken tractor?" you ask?  I hope to do a blog entry on them soon.

            In 8 or 9 weeks they will look like plain old big, white  chickens, not nearly so cute, and will be ready to butcher. But for now....they are fuzzy and cute, aren’t they?