These are the babies from last weeks hatch. See the little black headed bird peeking over the back of the brown one. That is a Squirty baby, so is the little fluffy butt in the front. The yellow baby with black speckles on it's head is one of the cutest things you've ever seen and it really stands out amongst the sea of black and brown. The bigger brown ones in this picture have what looks like chubby cheeks that squishs their eyes a little. Just darling if you ask me.
This is why I love my husband! Look at the size of this thing! He built this for me over the last two days. See all the baby chicks in the one corner, theres FOURTEEN of them! Crazy how big this brooder is they are going to love it!!!! The hubs got all the material for free from the job site he is working on. See there is perks to being a blue collar worker ;) I did have to buy some hardware cloth and some sand. Let's talk about SAND!!! I absolutely love it in my chicken coops. When I first got chickens I put pine shavings in the brooders and coop! I loathe that stuff. Imagine me with a spoon trying to get every little chicken turd out of it :p And when you put it in the compost bin it takes forever to break down. So back to sand... did I mention I love it? Heres why 1* with a litter box scooper the lightly sanded chicken turds are easily on their way to the compost bin ♥ 2* no need to buy grit for chickens the sand is their grit ♥ 3* dust bath, sure heres you sand ♥ 4* when you change out the sand it can go into the garden or compost no problem ♥ 4* Twenty one feather footed chickens have clean feet ♥ We put the babies in last night and one of Squirty's little ones took a dust bath, it was the cutest thing I have ever seen. Did I mention that I have two of these brood boxes? The other one we have had but we modified it to make it bigger and hold the wonderful thing called SAND! It isn't as big as the new one but thats where the five, one month old chickens stay and they love it!!!! If you don't use sand in your chicken house you should try it! It keeps the birds wonderfully clean and makes fast work of chicken poop removal ☺
*UPDATE* I do not recommend using sand in the brooder. It was too dusty and at times I worried about the health of my babies. They were all fine but my husbands shop had dust in it for months which tells me those little chicks inhaled quite a bit. I do recommend sand in the run or in the bottom of a coop where the chickens roost at night. It's great there ☺
Great pen your hubby built for the new chicks!
ReplyDeleteThanks Beth, I think so too ☺
DeleteWhat a styling new pen! Just think of all future Squirty chicks you'll be brooding in there!
ReplyDeleteThanks Carolyn, I love it that they have soo much room!
DeleteThat is awesome...and even better the materials were free. He did a great job on it..I see a second career for him..Building chicken coops.. : )
ReplyDeleteLove the little babies, will show my boys the pics when they get home from school....
He is getting pretty good at it! Our first coop was a learning experience for both of us. This one went alot smoother (no arguing) Do you have chickens? My little one loves chicken littles and we have a ball with the bigs everyday too especially the crazy kid chasin' roosters!!!
DeleteThis is why I like following your blog and the people like you. I have been hatching chicks for the past 4 years and never once thought of putting a floor in my brooder and using sand. Thanks for the info. I can't wait to use this Ideal.
ReplyDeleteWell the sands works REALLY well when they get bigger because of the bigger poop. I clean all my cages/coops once a day the babies little poops kinda fall through the scoop but its better than anything else as far as keeping their feet clean ☺
DeleteThis is the second time I have heard someone rave about sand... it sets the mind a-tingling. Hubby may kill me though if I try to modify the coop, maybe that can go in the broody house plans!
ReplyDeleteIt works excellent in the hen house. They have bigger poop. They generally take dust baths in my flower garden around a tree, but I catch them bathing in the coop! The babies poop is soo small that it falls through my scoop, but if you get a closer together pooper scooper it would work. I just love the sand over anything else for keeping their feet clean ☺
DeleteNo Kelly, currently we live in a community with an HOA. But hopefully soon, we will have some property, and that is one of the first things I would like to start doing is keeping chickens. So I am trying to learn now as much as I can.
ReplyDeleteWhen you do get some land, chickens are the best!!!
DeleteWhat a sweet man to build that coop for you! Always nice to have a handy man!!! Looks very nice and lots of room for them to grow!
ReplyDeleteAnd cleaning up chicken poo is never fun, but to have it be a little easier is always nice.
He's my farm hand ☺ I love the brooder! My little chickens have sooo much room to grow!!!
DeleteHi Kelly, I just think that it is so sweet, all the fun that you are having with your new little babies. You are such a sweetie pie! Have a great day, Connie :)
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