How to raise a chicken from an egg: when is it better to breed, home care

Many homeowners try to raise their own chickens. For people who have never done this, this is not easy to do and therefore it is necessary to familiarize yourself in advance with how to raise a chicken from an egg.

Which is better: raised with a hen or in an incubator?

Before you start rearing, you need to determine what is best: raise chickens in an incubator or with a hen.

Benefits of Brooding

Some people do not want to raise birds in an incubator and therefore look for a hen so that the hen will breed new offspring by herself.

The main advantages of this hatching method include the following:

• no need to constantly monitor the temperature inside the incubation structure;
• you don't have to feed the little chicks yourself, as the mother hen does it herself;
• chicken independently monitors the heating of the offspring and helps him hatch from the egg;
• hen guards young birds and protects them from any danger.

Incubation method

Most often, people are breeding new offspring of chickens in a brooder. The main advantages of using the incubation method when raising birds include:

• low cost of the structure in which the chicks will be raised;
• ease of use of the incubator;
• possibility of breeding several dozen young individuals;
• low labor cost;
• raising chickens of any age.

Among the disadvantages of using incubators is that in order to ensure their performance, it is necessary to ensure an uninterrupted supply of electricity.

When is the best time to breed chicks?

Before you start breeding chickens, you need to determine when it is best to hatch them. You can hatch young birds at any time of the year. However, to avoid problems, it is recommended to do this in warm weather, when the air temperature does not drop below 10-15 degrees Celsius. Therefore, many poultry farmers advise hatching chicks in the month of May or June.

When growing in an incubator, you can do this earlier - at the end of March or in April.

What to do immediately after the appearance of the chicks?

After the young chicks have hatched, it is necessary to start drying them. If they appeared in the incubator, then they will dry out on their own. When they appeared under the hen, you will have to carefully get them out of the nest. This is done carefully so that the chicken does not notice and does not leave the place of masonry. All young chicks are placed under the lamp until they are dry.

When they are completely dry, they are placed back under the hen for further rearing.

What conditions do day old chicks need?

To ensure that day-old chicks do not die quickly, they must be properly cared for. Growing such birds should be carried out at a suitable temperature. Temperature indicators inside the incubator should not fall below twenty degrees Celsius. To ensure that the maintenance of chickens is not accompanied by problems, additional lamps for heating are installed.

In the early days, you will have to feed the chicks yourself. To do this, use a pipette, with which you can feed and drink them.

Light mode

Chickens are not kept in the dark and therefore reliable lighting should be arranged in advance. To improve lighting use special infrared bulbs. Their advantages include the following:

• ease of operation;
• low cost;
• reliability and long operating time, which is 4-5 thousand hours;
• calming effect on young chicks;
• possibility of regulation of working capacity.

Features of food

It is necessary to familiarize yourself with the nutritional characteristics of chickens in advance in order to feed them correctly.

What to give in the first days of life

Feeding chickens in the first day of life is considered an important task that confronts a person. If a poultry farmer wants to raise he althy chicks, he must know how to feed them. The easiest way is if the chicks hatched from eggs that are incubated with a crotch. In this case, a person only needs to take care of feeding the chicken, since she will do the rest on her own.

If the chickens hatched in an incubator, you will have to give them food yourself. In the first days after birth, they are given plain water through a pipette.

Feeding day old chicks

Real feeding of chickens begins a day after birth from eggs. Day-old chicks should be fed as follows:

• first you need to prepare a special drinker, with which the chicks will drink fresh water;
• for manual feeding of birds, a pipette is prepared in advance;
• boiled yolk mixed with semolina or wheat groats can be used as complementary foods;
• during feeding you can not mix different types of cereals and therefore one type of grain is given at a time.

Weekly

Week-old chicks are easier to feed, as you can prepare feed for them yourself. To do this, you will need the following components:

• two and a half cups of corn;
• spoon vegetable oil;
• a third cup of wheat;
• 40 grams of fishmeal;
• three spoons of fodder yeast.

All of the listed ingredients are mixed, after which the resulting mixture is fed to chickens.

Monthly

Many are interested in what you can feed chickens, whose age has reached one month. Such chicks are considered quite strong and therefore they are given the same food as ordinary chickens. However, there are some differences in the type of food used. When feeding chickens, it is recommended to give not whole, but ground grains. Also during feeding use the following:

• cottage cheese;
• compound feed;
• boiled vegetables;
• fresh grass;
• vitamins.

Chicken diseases

It is recommended to deal with common chick diseases in advance.

Symptoms and treatment

Indigestion is a common malady in chicks. It manifests itself if you feed them incorrectly. The main causes of indigestion are considered to be feeding contaminated water and too roughage.In this case, all birds will have to be soldered with antibiotics and fattened with cottage cheese and compound feed.

Vaccination at home

Chicks are vaccinated in the first days of their lives. Most often, they use means that are buried in the eyes. Before the introduction of the agent, the body of the chick must be carefully fixed, after which the vaccine is applied to the eyes with a pipette.

Diseases in broiler chickens

Common diseases in broiler chickens include the following:

1. Aspergillosis. This is a dangerous viral disease that affects the respiratory tract of chickens. Treatment is with antiviral drugs.
2. Salmonellosis. The disease most often affects young individuals. Symptoms of salmonellosis include puffy eyes, indigestion, stunted growth, and loss of appetite.
3. Pullorose. This disease manifests itself in both young and adult birds. The development of the disease is evidenced by the constant thirst of chickens, as well as poor appetite.

Conclusion

Some summer residents want to raise chickens on their own. Before proceeding with this, it is necessary to familiarize yourself with how to raise and feed small chicks.

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