We Bought a Farm: Baby Chicks Arrive

It's always an exciting time when baby chicks arrive at the farm. While laying chickens are the most exciting because, let's face it, we don't eat them ... meat chickens are almost as exciting.

There is something completely marvelous about receiving these tiny little chicks and eight weeks later processing them ourselves and filling up our freezers with all the chicken we need for a year!

Here is a video of how we get the chicks out of their packaging and into the brooder as fast as possible. We want the temperature in the brooder to be close to 95 degrees. This was a cold day for June.

You will notice that we have to:

• Count the chickens.
• Dip each of the chickens in their water to "awaken" them to the fact that they need to start eating and drinking.
• Fun Fact: A baby chick has all the nutrients they need from the egg they emerged from to live 48-hours before they need to start eating and drinking other stuff. (Thus the reason you can ship them immediately after they are born.)
• Fun Fact #2: There are two little "layers" in the brooder that you hear Abigail talking about. These are not meat chickens. These are random other birds that the company asks for permission to send to you free of charge if they have a surplus they need to disperse.

It's especially exciting when the shipment arrives alive and thriving. When after 24-hours, the vast majority are doing great, and everything appears to be working correctly and well, we feel really good about our mad farming skills.

Of course, not to be a pessimist, but this is farming, and we always have to be prepared for something to not go completely as planned. Shortly after getting everyone settled, Jacob discovered that we had a chick acting very oddly.You can see it in this video below. (If you listen closely you will hear our wwoofers Jake and Jacob making a few funny jokes to the end to lighten the mood.)

Jacob and JB made the decision to put this chicken down as there is a contagious issue that it could have been. 

For now, we have had 310 out 314 chickens alive and pecking around the brooder! They will remain in the brooder to control their temperature for two weeks before we move them out to the pasture.