Hello, we've got chicks all around us today.
I thought it might be interesting to see what we do between the eggs in the
incubator and the chicks in the brooder. So, that process that we go through to
move the chicks from their nice secure and very humid environment in the
incubator out into the wider world. I've been showing you how I've been
setting up the brooder over the last few days.So in our breeder pen there is
chopped rapeseed straw on the base of it and I've put in the electric hen and
I've switched that on I filled up a small feeding tray with chick crumb. And
because we only use organic products, it's an organic chick crumb and in there
water container I have put, well, what I think Justin Rhodes calls magic water
and it is! What I do is I take a jam jar and a couple of teaspoons of honey into
it and a splash, but not too much, of apple cider vinegar with garlic and then
top that up with water. Give it a really good shake and put that into
their water so that when they when they first start drinking they've got the
goodness from the honey and they've got the apple cider vinegar,
which is supposed to be good for their internal systems, as is garlic and it
just gives them a really good boost for the first few days. So that's outside and
it's all set up and ready for them. Around that nursery pen I've wrapped the
bubble wrap with the silver lining which will reflect the heat back inside,
the idea is we just want to keep them cozy and comfy like they would be if
they were under mother hen.
Now I've said it before and I'll say it again, it is really important that you do
not keep opening your incubator lid or the door of it to see what is going on.
Once those eggs have gone into the lockdown phase where they're no
longer being turned and they're just lying still, it's really important
not to reduce the amount of humidity because... I think it's probably the
easiest way to explain is this is your eggshell. Inside that shell there is a
membrane. When you boil an egg, you know when you bash the top of the egg
there's then that kind of layer, that white membrane layer, that's the layer
I'm talking about. If the humidity gets too low in that incubator what happens
is that membrane layer shrinks and it will shrink wrap the chick!
You've just, it's awful, I'm smiling about it because it's just
that, you know, it was a hard lesson learned, but it will shrink wrap those
babies in their egg. And they're just never going to be able to hatch because
once that the membrane gets dry, it's almost leathery. It becomes really
tough and it's a difficult process for them to get out of an egg as it is, if
you then give them a thick leather layer it's just not going to happen. That's the
reason that is so important not to reduce the humidity and the thing that
reduces the humidity is just having a look, and having a look, and popping your
hand in. And the first few hatches I did, I had been told this and but I hadn't properly
taken it on board and I shrink wrapped quite a lot of chickens. So I have
learned the lesson and that's why I'm sharing it quite so forcefully. It is
really importan. So having said that when the incubator gets quite full, yes I
take some, I lift the lid and I take some out, but I do check. In fact I've talked
about this as I'm doing it, so I'll talk about a little bit more
further into this video.
And the next step is to take your chicks and get them into a brooder. Now I don't
do this until they are at least 24 hours old, and I know that some other people do,
but I like to ensure that all their little baby fluff is completely dry. And that they are
strong and healthy and they've absorbed all that yolk into their bodies. And so
they're absolutely good to go. Chicks are okay in the incubator for up to
three days after hatching. In an incubator this size three days is plenty of time
for all your eggs to hatch, or thereabouts. What I usually do is that
after the first 24 hours or so, I have a look and see how many eggs have already
pipped and are there eggs that are mostly hatched. And if there are, I wait but if
they're ones that have just got little pips on them but I've got the incubator full
of chicks, the ones have been hatched for at least 24 hours and are completely fluffed
up, I take out. And I do that by tipping the lid very carefully popping my hands
in and getting them out. So I've already taken half of them out and got them into
the brooder and today I'm going to get this little a lot into the brooder.
So, coat on and all ready to go outside because once I've got them out
of there, I don't want to be having them hanging around in the cold while
I'm sorting out coat and things. So, I'm all ready to take them outside. One
other thing I need is a container to put them in when I take them out of there. Now in the
past I've used the cardboard box with a tea towel in the bottom of it, but more
recently I've been using a bag and now I say its a plastic bag that's
not quite, it's an oil cloth bag with a nice flat base to it which I've also
put a tea towel in. Because obviously a tea towel can just be taken out and boiled
to clean it. And once I've opened the lid I need to do this pretty quickly and get
the lid shut again because there are still three eggs in there that
I need to have a look at afterwards, but I don't want them going cold. And more to
the point, don't want the humidity disappearing in the meantime. Right now
little chickadees, are you ready to come out into the big wide world? Are you?
So I don't really want to delay, I'm just gonna take you straight across to the
brooder. When you move the chicks from the incubator into the brooder it's
really important that those chicks know where their water is. So the way I
do that is just dip the end of the beak of each chick into that water, don't put
it in too far because there's a risk of drowning it. So just beak in and then I
just check to make sure it's going nom nom nom, to taste the water and then it should
and I carry on finding the water without any problems after that.
Well that's it, the chicks are now in the nursery pen and they will get joined
by anymore like hatch. We've got the second incubator that is due to
hatch tomorrow and the eggs have started pipping so hopefully we will have more
tomorrow. And they will go and join the others after the 24 to 48 hour period of
them drying out. Once they are out of their shells, drying out and getting
fluffy and healthy. The first incubator had three eggs left
in it, two of them have done nothing and the
third one, well, you know I lifted the lid and you know I've been saying about
be really careful, don't lift the lid for too much because it'll shrink
around the babies, well guess what- this poor little thing was part of the way
out of its shell when I got the others out and yes, it got to dry. Now it has
managed to just about claw its way out but
it's not doing very well and my gut feeling is that it won't survive.
And it was a gamble because when I lifted the lid to take those
others out, I knew there was one that was partly pipped. It had about a
penny size hole in it, however it hadn't moved all, I hadn't seen it move
all day. And they had picked that hole and it made that hole yesterday, so it
had gone all the way through the night and for most of the day today,
so I thought it was dead. I thought it had just died in its shell. Anyway when I
came back in from taking the others out to the nursery pen, it was cheeping, very
loudly, it was obviously in some distress. So it's now out of the shell, it does
look like that could be something wrong with its legs, it's holding its
neck at a very stiff angle, but I'm going to leave it in there untouched without
lifting the lid for another 24 hours to give it a chance to build its strength
and fluff out. And we'll assess the situation then. Well that's it for me today,
I am heading back outside to watch the little chicks in the nursery
pen and then I shall come back in and stare at the eggs in the incubator, in
the hope that some of those will appear. And I need to do a
little bit less staring at the chicks and a little bit more cooking us a
meal because we haven't had a proper meal yet toda,y because we've been so
wrapped up in in watching the chicks.
And so wherever you are in the world and
whatever you've got planned for toda,y I hope it's good one and I also hope you
can join me again tomorrow.