On the first month,

especially in the first week of life, chicks need special care. It is necessary to strictly adhere to the feeding schedule. Also, even more attention should be paid to drinkers and water that the chickens will drink.

Первый месяц,

особенно первую неделю жизни, птенцы нуждаются в особой заботе. Необходимо строго придерживаться графика кормления. Так же еще большее внимание стоит уделять поилкам и воде, которую будут пить цыплята.

Nutrition

Many go into detail about the first feeding of chicks, but the more important step is getting to the water. Water is the first thing that should enter the baby’s body in order to smoothly start the work of the entire digestive system. Therefore, it should be easily accessible immediately after hatching. Should be clean, room temperature. It is important to install a drinking bowl so that it is convenient to drink, but it was not possible to climb into it with your feet. Because the dirt and droppings that have fallen from the paws into the water, and then into the stomach, at best, will cause poisoning, at worst, the death of a fragile baby. Babies need to change the water at least three times a day. It is necessary to disinfect drinkers at this age 2 times a week. Then once every two weeks.

Previously, it was believed that the first feeding should occur on the second day. This opinion was wrong. If you look at the natural behavior of chickens after hatching, you can find confirmation of this. As soon as the chicks dry out and appear from under the wing of the laying hen, they immediately begin to peck at something. That is, soon after the withdrawal, the body gives them a message to act, to search for food. Now poultry scientists agree that the faster the first meal comes, the faster the resorption of the residual yolk mass occurs, the better the chicks develop. The norm is food intake during the first 8 hours of life. A good first meal would be a finely ground high-quality grain mixture with the addition of a finely chopped hard-boiled egg or low-fat, well-pressed cottage cheese. Starting from the third day of life, fresh greens can be introduced into the diet: nettle, alfalfa, clover. After the fifth day, it is allowed to slightly reduce the degree of grinding of the feed. From day 6, feed of animal origin begins to be introduced. They have a large supply of protein, which is necessary for a growing body in large quantities.

In the first week of life, you need to feed 8 times a day. This mode must be maintained until the chickens reach 10 days of age, then there is a reduction to 5 times a day. This mode is maintained until the young animals reach the age of one and a half months. Then the food system changes again. The first month of a baby’s life is associated with a large investment of time and resources, since during this period the chicks need special care. Unfortunately, not all breeders have enough time for this. Lack of time is the highlight of the twenty-first century. Therefore, many of them prefer to buy combined feed for chickens. By consistency, it is dry and finely ground, which is great for the digestion of chicks. This method of feeding saves not only time on organizing meals, but also on preparing a diet and cooking. An additional plus is that up to 20 necessary components can be present in the feed at the same time (which is impossible to implement at home), crushed and mixed to a homogeneous mass. Most often, compound feed for chickens is bought in bulk, since under proper storage conditions, it is able to retain all useful properties for a long time. Whichever method of feeding you choose in the end, the main thing to remember is the daily allowance and the bird’s needs for various nutrients. A deviation in plus or minus leads to a decrease in the health and productivity of the bird. Therefore, no matter what food you give, the main thing is to maintain a balance of trace elements.

Conditions of detention

The first month, especially the first week of life, chicks need special care. The room for their maintenance should be warm and dry, with a ventilation system, but without drafts. The temperature regime is equally important. The first 6 days of life, it is necessary to maintain a temperature of 32-35 degrees. From day 7, it is reduced to 30-32 degrees. A week later, another 3 degrees. By the month, the room temperature should be about 20-24 degrees.

Coating. You can not keep the bird on a cold surface, especially babies. This will almost certainly lead to the death of a significant part of the livestock. There should be soft padding under your feet. A good one should be deep, it helps to retain heat, protects the legs of chickens from the cold, and even is a source of nutrients. The composition of the bedding material can vary significantly. Bedding mixtures have proved to be the best. It is desirable that they contain peat, straw shavings and sawdust. These materials perfectly remove excess moisture, absorb droppings and the remains of broken eggs, preceding the appearance of the habit of pecking them. Another important point for the health of the bird. The approach to the feeder must be ensured in such a way that the bird does not stand on the cold floor while eating. Even for adults, this is quite dangerous; for young ones, this is a sentence.

Thank you for reading our article! May your birds be healthy!

Read about poultry feed here:
Complete feed for villages
Read the rules for feeding young chickens here:
Compound feed for young chickens from 8 to 14 weeks
Feeding young birds. Read more here:
Compound feed for broiler chickens from 1 to 5 weeks