Feeding day old and grown chickens
The correct keeping and feeding of chickens in the first days of their life determines how strong and healthy they will grow up as a bird. In order for the internal organs and digestive system of chicks to begin to actively develop, they must be fed within 16 hours after hatching. The probability of survival of each chick in this case increases by 20%. Chicks should be fed frequently and in small portions.
If you do not know how to properly feed the chickens in the first days of their life, then the death of the entire brood is inevitable.
What to feed day old chicks
- feed should only contain natural and fresh ingredients;
- you need to give out feeding at the same time;
- chickens should always be full.
For the first 10 days, the brood should be fed every 2 hours, including at night. You also need to carefully compose the diet - it must contain all the nutrients necessary for growth.
For freshly hatched chicks, it is best to use finely chopped and hard-boiled eggs and curd mixed with corn or semolina. For 10 chicks, you will need 1 egg, 50 grams of cottage cheese and 50 grams of cereals.
Crushed rolled oats, millet, barley, wheat groats or starter feed are also suitable. There must be clean and boiled water at room temperature next to food. In addition to it, kefir or low-fat curdled milk can be used to feed chickens from the first day.
As soon as the brood has grown up to three days of age, they begin to accustom it to grass. For this, the greens of such plants as dandelion, alfalfa, clover, dried nettle or plantain are finely chopped. On the 10th day, you can already give boiled vegetables, for example potatoes, carrots, zucchini and so on. Wet mash for chick feeding is bred in such quantity that chicks can eat at one time. If food is left in the trough for too long, it will go bad. In addition, chicks will cover it with garbage and excrement. If they eat such food, then they will develop an eating disorder, due to which the entire brood may die.
The main rule to follow before feeding only hatched chicks is that food must be digestible and sterile.
After the 10th day, small pebbles (gravel, sand) or crushed shells should be given, they are necessary not only for digesting food, but also as mineral supplements. At this age, it is no longer necessary to feed the chickens at night. During the day, they give feeding every 3-4 hours. What else you can feed 10-day-old chickens at home is soaked stale bread in kefir. Before serving, you need to squeeze and crush it. Meat broth or meat scraps can be a great source of protein deficiency.
After the chicks have eaten, check to see if all chicks have full goiters. If someone is noticeably different, then he needs to be placed in another cage and fed.
If the brood is constantly kept in a cage without a walk, then it may develop vitamin deficiency. As a result, the chicks will stop growing and may become ill. To do this, it is necessary to give vitamin supplements containing vitamins of groups A, E, D. During the feeding of day-old chickens at home, 1 tablet of multivitamins is added to the food. It is enough for 10 chicks.
How to properly maintain chickens
In the first days of life, the brood is especially weak and easily sick, which leads to its death. Therefore, it is imperative that the chicks have a warm, draft-free environment to grow. Most often they use a large box or brooder, and a lamp with a conventional incandescent lamp is installed as a heater. Its power is calculated in such a way that the temperature in the cage is the same in all places and equals + 30 ° C.
Moreover, for 1 m2 no more than 25 chicks can be placed, and after they reach one month of age, up to 17 heads are placed on the same area. Before feeding the chickens in the first days of their life, it is necessary to lay paper on the floor of the box and fill it with compound feed or small corn grits. Chicks will be able to quietly rummage in such bedding without harm to their health.
Trough and the drinker should be designed so that chicks cannot get in with their feet. Dirty water and feed are excellent breeding grounds for intestinal diseases.
Compound feed
What else you can feed chickens in the first days is starting compound feed, or as it is also called "zero" in another way. The main ingredients of the mixture are wheat, corn, peas and barley. Also contained in small doses is fish meal, amino acids and vegetable fats. The norm for one chicken per day is from 10 to 30 grams. Combined mixtures enriched with vitamins, such as "Sun", are even better suited. The daily norm is 10-55 grams per head. Compound feed marked "Growth" is given to two-week-old chickens. Its composition is designed in such a way that the bird gains weight as quickly as possible. And the ingredients in it are ground noticeably larger than in the starting one, since the chicks at this age are already able to digest them.
It is not at all necessary to buy combined mixtures for feeding chickens, they can be made with your own hands.
For a starter compound feed, you will need to mix the following ingredients:
- corn - 50% of the total volume;
- barley - 8%;
- wheat - 16%;
- kefir with a low percentage of fat - 12%;
- cake - 14%.
All components must be carefully crushed to small crumbs so that the chickens can easily swallow them. For chicks aged more than two weeks to 1 month, the composition of the combined mixture changes slightly:
- corn - 48%;
- feed fat or unrefined sunflower oil - 1%;
- wheat - 13%;
- powdered milk - 4%;
- freshly cut grass - 3%;
- feed yeast - 5%;
- fish meal - 6%.
If the chickens have problems with the intestines (weak stools), then instead of pure water, water diluted with potassium permanganate to a slightly pinkish tint is placed for 30 minutes.
After the chicks are one week old, bunches of various herbs can be hung on the walls to them in the cage. If a weak chick appears among the whole livestock, it must be separated from the brood in another box. This is necessary in order to protect healthy chicks, and it was more convenient to treat the patient.