Chicken Accommodations

It's been a while since the last post. This chicks are now about 3 times bigger than they were when we bought them! As you can tell, bigger chicks means bigger accommodations. After a while, the chicks began to learn how to fly. They were escaping the box quite often, so our dear friend Emily decided to get them a larger space. We also had a mediocre bulb (which eventually burnt out) and we were borrowing one of the science teachers lamps. Emily was gracious enough to buy us a heating lamp for the chicks, as the white light messed with the chicks sleeping schedule. This is what the set up looked like after Emily upgraded their tiny accommodations:

The New Accommodations - Outside

The New Accommodations - Inside

As you can see, the chicks did not have a legitimate food or water dispenser (broken), but we got new ones. (There was a screen on top of the box, but it was taken off for the photo.) There will be more photos to come!

Picking Up Chicks! Literally!

Yesterday I went to Farmers Feed & Supply in Gilroy with my family. They had a variety of animals, as they had turtles, chickens, an assortment of birds, and rabbits. We got three different breeds of chickens. We bought 2 Barred Rock hens, 2 Rhode Island Red hens, and 2 Buff Orpington hens. Each chick is now about 3 days old. Here are some pictures of our visit:

Tortoises in the chicken coop 

Peacocks they were selling

Roosters for sale

The Chick Aisle

Price for the Barred Rock Chicks

The Barred Rock Chicks

Price for the Buff Orpington Chicks

Buff Orpington Chicks

Rhode Island Red Chick Prices

Rhode Island Red Chicks

After we purchased the chicks, we kept the car warm and drove to the school to pick up our supplies. The chicks were in a paper bag, so we had to be quick. When we got home, we quickly realized that we didn't have food for the chicks. By the time we got home it was late, so we were not able to get proper food, so we looked up if we could use parakeet food instead, as we still had some parakeet food from our past pets. We compared the ingredients in the parakeet food and the chick feed and they were similar. We also looked up the opinions of experienced chicken owners and they thought the chicks would really like the food. We then used a 100 watt bulb as a heat lamp after we had the box brooder set up. Before the box was set up we used a heating pad. Here are some pictures of the set up process:

The chicks in the paper bag

The chicks on the heating pad

Chicks in the Brooder

Chicks in the Brooder

Chicks in the Brooder

We should get a proper feeder and water dispenser, so we will talk about it on Monday due to expenses and income. Names will also be discussed soon. That's all for now!