eggs & tea

I’m really excited to foster 25+ baby chicks for Hillery Gunther. So excited I can’t sleep. It’s nearly 1:30am.

Last week, I’ve been reviewing two books and one DVD to prepare for the babies:

SUCCESS WITH BABY CHICKS, by Robert Plamondon
A Complete Guide to Hatchery Selection, Mail-Order Chicks, Day-Old Chick Care, Brooding, Brooder Plans, Feeding, and Housing

STOREY’S GUIDE TO RAISING CHICKENS, by Gail Damerow
Everything you need to know to raise one chicken or 100. You’ll learn how to choose the right breed, care for chicks and build feeders and shelters.

REGARDING CHICKENS, by Fred Dunn
Learn all about hatching and raising chickens before you make your purchase, or adopt the neighbor’s abandoned birds.  This how-to DVD was more than 7 months in the making, comprising over 2 hours & 50 minutes of valuable guides related to raising chickens today.

The babies are due to arrive early Monday morning on May 18th at the Honokaa Post Office. I will be sitting on pins and needles for a call from them. Their loading dock doors open at 7:30AM. I looked back at my records in 2006 and our current flock (also from McMurray) arrived on February 13th, 2006, a Monday with freak lightning storm.

I’ll be taking on the care of Hillery’s new “peep peeps” for the next six weeks. Hillery placed an order through McMurray Hatchery for a mix of Partridge Cochins and Australorps. She adored one of our Australorp named Barbie (her feathers are super prosh and she’s neatly groomed for a hen). She is so happy that the chicks will get lots of care & attention from me. My goal is to raise human-friendly chickens for Hillery’s coffee farm.

The chick brooder is all set up in the greenhouse. I’ve reclaimed cardboard and taped together an area about 5.5 feet x 5 feet (27.50 sq. ft) for the 25 new darlings. The walls are about 20″ tall, enough to keep the chicks from hightailing it out of the brooder pen. I’ve turned on the 125 watt heat lamp and 75 watt incandescent bulb tonight to warm up the pen.

I was worried that it might get too hot in our greenhouse & overheat the babies, so Jimmy helped me pound 4 bamboo stakes (also about 20″ tall) into the corners of the pen. He then strung some twine around the perimeter of the poles and diagonally through the corners. I can drape a 6 feet x 6 feet green shade cloth over the strings to give the chicks some shade during the hottest part of the day.

Incidentally, Ruthie & Jimmy put in the young tomato & cucumber plant last week. I look forward to my summer sandwich: perfectly toasted sourdough bread from Trader Joe’s, thinly coated with Japanese Kewpie mayo, just frim slices of avocado from our neighbor’s tree complemented with thick, juicy slices of summer tomatoes sprinkled with a little sea salt. Yum!

The dirt floor of the pen is covered from two pieces of black shade cloth, taped together. Then, I opened up the empty bags of the organic chicken feed paper sacks and separated the triple layers. I used the large paper layers to cover the pen and topped it off with paper towels.

Why paper towels?

There’s traction when 3-day old chicks walk on paper towels. Ben asked me to collect all the poopy towels & litter for his long-term compost pile. He’s the compost king around the homestead.

I’ve set up the trough feed with organic chick starter and sprinkled some on the paper towels. In the morning, I’m going to fill the two 1-gallon waterer with 1.5 cups sugar & filtered water for the chicks.

I can’t wait for the new sound of eager, curious chicks peeping & running around the brooding pen!

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