Welcome to the Poultry Keepers Podcast where we talk poultry from feathers to function. In this episode Jeff Mattocks, Karen Johnston and Rip Stalvee will take you through the things you need to know to raise birds from day old until they lay their first egg. So let’s get started shall we.
Hey, before we dive into our meat of the matter, I've got something I want to share with you. You've heard Jeff talk about this, you've heard Karen talk about this, and you've heard me talk about this, but I thought it would be nice to let you hear what somebody else had to say on this subject. And recently, just a couple of days ago Leanna Howard made a post on, or made a comment on a post in the nutrition site.
She was talking about the poultry breeder poultry showbird and breeder supplement from Fertrell. I was introduced to the breeder supplement back around Thanksgiving. I know that feed had been lacking, but this year it seems to work.
What's
the chatter I've been hearing around all over as well? My entire feeding regiment had to change to implement this, and I wasn't able to change out 15 breeding groups and 200 chickens all at one time. So I started with three groups. Those groups were all older hens and within 3 4 weeks those groups were producing larger eggs, healthier, vibrant colors, and I want to add, I was completely following the, I wasn't completely following the prescribed recommendations.
I was doing the best I could for the holiday season. Oh, he's older than that. And topping without oil. And there was still major improvement. They started growing their feathers faster than they had in the past after molding. When I say eggs were bigger, he hands it up. Always seem to lay small eggs consistently or producing large and extra large eggs. While egg size is good, their overall health is better as well.
On New Year's weekend, we started to convert all breeder coops to hanging feeders and I started mixing feed for half of our flock. Unfortunately, we didn't finish them all. This weekend, we'll finish them all. The birds seem full and are happy. After I feed them. And the major plus is they're consuming less feed. While there's a price increase in my feed bill, it's actually about the same. Like I said, all three of us have been talking about this, so now you heard it from the fourth person.
And we've had others too, but I thought that one just exceptionally well, and thought I would share that with y'all. Guys, what do you say we go ahead and get started? Sure. Act like we know what we're doing or something.
Might as well start the new year like that.
There you go. All right. Culled through a lot of the groups that we're in and our groups and other groups, but trying to get a feel for what was piquing folks interest about this time of year. And I saw a lot about starting baby chicks and then growing them out and then what to do as they got older. So we thought we'd start with. Tonight, from day one, and why is the first week of a chick's life so important? I see that or, something very similar to it posted many times this time of year.
Jeff, what's your thoughts?
Rip, you and I were talking about this earlier today, and there are so many metabolic functions like the circulatory system, the digestive track, the, the gut. All of those things in that first seven days are established, right? And there's so much transformation in that chick. The people, and you, it, we posted the, we posted a PDF that really outlines it and describes it.
To the group file section earlier today, but folks, it's just, it's unbelievable how many things how many, like I said, body functions are established in that first seven days. And it's, I think a lot of people miss it, as far as proper care, proper nutrition, proper, And everything matters, right? That first seven days is the most critical in the chick's life.
And one thing I've noticed, that if you miss that first seven days, it's hard to get them caught up after that.
You don't, you never catch them up, right? You don't ever. They might look like the rest of the flock, they might, but they're never going to be a hundred percent. They cannot be a hundred percent, week one, that like I said, so many things are being developed in that chick's body at a very rapid rate. And week two is almost as important, that if we miss it in week one that's actually even shorter than that in the first 48 hours.
They scientifically know this has been studied numerous times, if a chick does, in the first 48 hours, a chick or a chicken establishes its eating habits, right? Whether it's going to be a good eater, whether it's going to be a picky eater, whether it's going to be a floor eater, whatever, right? In the first 48 hours, the entire life of that chicken, the way it will eat, it's aggressiveness towards eating will be established in that first 48 hours. We know this.
This isn't, I'm not making it up. This isn't an old wives tale. This is a real deal. They need to, the commercial industry needs to know this stuff, when it comes to raising chickens. So you got 48 hours to get a chick on feed. On feed and on water. Are you
still there?
We can hardly hear you, Jeff.
All right. Maybe magically it will fix itself.
We'll hope so.
One thing that Jeff has talked about, and here again, it's something we've all talked about before, is early on in a chick's life is to get them started on either whole milk or For me, I found it's a little easier to get them to start eating yogurt if I mash up a, an egg and mix it in with that seems to attract them to it better, but the dairy products just, believe it or not, it'll really help prevent coccidiosis, and I think I've heard Jeff say that it's, it's not the digesting of the milk
itself, it's the good gut bacteria that is associated with the milk that does the trick. Am I correct there, Jeff?
You are. Are you hearing me any better now, Rip, or no? Yes. Don't bet. Okay, sorry. I don't know what happened earlier, but, Yeah the simple sugars, like the lactoses the fats in dairy products, feed the natural bacteria of the digestive tract, right? And those are what we want to feed. And it's an exclusion process.
So if we can feed all the natural occurring bacteria in the gut of the chicken, it reduces the space or the area in which The coccidiosis can attach to the intestinal wall and live and breed so the more we can feed the bacteria with probiotics or milk or other the less space there is for coccidiosis to live in a digestive tract. That's the thought process behind milk. But, using dairy products or milk products has been around for a hundred years.
I have an old article from, I believe it's Chino State out in California from 1929, where they discovered that milk controlled coccidiosis. So that's, this isn't new,
stacey wants to know raw milk or yogurt better than pasteurized milk?
I don't think it really matters, Stacey, as long as it's whole milk products that still have the fat in it. I come from the thinking where I think. Raw milk is the best yogurt, especially if it's homemade yogurt, it would be second, and yeah, to me they're better just simply because they haven't been processed, and heated and all that, but not everybody has access to raw milk,
and,
or raw milk yogurt, I would give it a slight edge.
And, folks, don't forget, if you've got a question, be sure and ask us. We are more than happy to answer it on what we're talking about tonight, or really any other question. If we can, we'll be happy to deal with them during the course of the show. That gets us through the important things to really do during that first week.
And, Jeff, one question I see come up a lot, and I see being talked about a lot, is that people just seem to Feel the need for whatever reason, I know there's multiple reasons out there, that they need to feed a really high protein chick starter.
All right, before you guys start on that, let's get John's question out. Okay.
Yeah. Goat milk. Does it matter what species? No, it doesn't. Goat's milk is great. Again pretty much anything. I don't care if you got horse milk, camel milk, goat milk, yak milk. Doesn't water buffalo, they're all going to work.
As long as it's an actual animal, right? Not almond. And,
not almond, not coconut, not cashew. No, those don't work. But, yeah. Yeah.
Alright, keep going then.
Yeah, Rip, I see it too and I don't even really know how to address it. And I'm glad you brought it up tonight. I see people feeding 26 percent game bird starters and I see people feeding, 24 percent starters and it's there is a danger to this, right? Because the kidney has to process unutilized protein in the digestive tract. Especially if these higher proteins are being fed for too long, right? Way past it.
Yeah.
That, that need for that higher protein is really only in the first six to eight weeks. Then that protein should be gradually coming down. You got the starter phase, grower phase, developer phase, it needs to be coming down. So forcing the kidneys to deal with that extra protein is hard on them. And the timing of this is really good because just in the last, This past week and a half, I've actually helped a couple people identify a condition called gout.
And what happens is the chicken will high step. Rip, you ever seen a chicken take that exaggerated, real big step?
Oh yeah.
High stepping is a sign of, is one of the signs and there was another picture posted on one of the groups earlier this week where they had processed a chicken, for table meat and they showed the picture of the feet were actually ammonia burned from excess nitrogen being fed to the chicken. Feeding extra protein at the wrong times actually does as much harm as it does good.
What, the reason people are doing it though, Rip, so let's back up again, but the reason they're doing it is they see a response in feathers. So people with show birds they see a feather boost. What they don't realize is what they're really getting are the amino acids. They're not getting the protein. The amino acids are higher in a higher protein feed, right? So they're getting the amino acids.
Meanwhile, the birds are dealing with all that excess nitrogen, which comes out as ammonia, which is harmful to the lungs. It's harmful to the feet. It's harmful to you. So I understand why they're doing it. I think there's a better way to do it, right? And I think, working on bumping up those amino acids to the appropriate levels they're going to see the same results and they can save themselves a lot of money because those higher protein feeds are expensive. Really unnecessary.
You were talking about it being harmful to the lungs and to the feet, but there's a danger and then it could actually burn the eyes on our birds.
Yeah, that's what the ammonia does. Yeah, for years, and people can look it up and Google it, and maybe we can find some pictures of ammonia burn, on a chicken eye. But the aisle instead of being really glassy and clear, it'll get cloudy and have a dull look to it. And I know we've talked about it before, but here's the thing. A chicken can only handle up to about 10 parts per million in the air. And that number doesn't mean anything to anybody listening. But, here's the key thing.
The human nose cannot detect ammonia in the air. until it hits 20 parts per million. So by the time you can smell it, we're already twice as high as what a chicken's lung tissue can manage. If you can smell ammonia, it's, I don't want to say it's too late, but there's already damage occurring, right? Flow in these chicken barns, believe it or not, your bird can tolerate cold temperatures better than they can stinky air. So don't close up your chicken coops too tight. You gotta have air flow.
Ventilation is so important, folks. It's
more important than the feed.
I see pictures of folks going out and wrapping their coops in plastic and all that, and I can't help but wonder, yeah. Oh, where's the airflow, guys? Come on now. Yeah.
You'd think the cellophane aisle at the grocery store is empty by the amount they're wrapping around those chicken heads. Ha. They want to bundle them up and make it airtight, and they don't realize they're doing more harm than good.
Yes.
Honestly, same thing in the incubators. Yeah.
Yeah, people
are like, oh, I've got to wrap this up so that we can have it be as consistent a temperature as possible and
But they don't realize the downside to it.
All right, are we?
Yeah, let's go on to the next one Karen And here's another one that I'm starting to see an uptick in these sorts of questions At what age can chicks go without supplemental heat? And invariably what I'll tell folks is You I don't necessarily always go by a set particular age because it can vary from breed to breed. It can vary whether your birds are slow feathering or fast feathering.
My Rhode Island Reds, they don't have enough feathers on them at four weeks to keep themselves warm to begin with. I let them go a little bit longer and I reduced the heat. But Jeff, you work with the commercial folks a lot. What? What are they doing now?
We know, again, we're back to fact based information here, but we know that a chick cannot regulate its own body temperature for the first 10 days for sure, right? 100 percent first 10 days. Now, this is on a Cornish cross that grows, very quickly. It's at least two weeks. for pretty much, like a commercial hen or something like that. Rip, you, you brought up this really great point is and I wanted to add to it is that you, you want to gradually reduce the temperature, right?
All chicks should be pretty good by, by three weeks old four at the longest, depending on how slow they develop. If you gradually. Raise the heater, or, you gradually reduce the temperature in the brooder, you observe the chicks, and if you see them huddling, and piling, then you know they're not ready to be without heat. You have to make the observation. It's really what the chick is doing.
There's not, there's not this perfect timeline or calendar where you can say, all right, day 14, I'm going to take the heat out. Day 21, I'm going to take the heat out. It's, it doesn't work that way. Every batch of chicks will be different. And you have to watch, are they evenly spaced out? Are they all right underneath the heat source? Are they all right? And, all the large commercial breed companies have excellent brooder management pictures, the whole bit. We can pull them off.
I think the one. Actually, the one show that Alyssa did way back in the beginning, she had all those pictures included there. Success with baby chicks or, how to start a baby chick. Those pictures are all there. They'll tell you what the chicks are doing, so if your heat is right, if it's located correctly, if it's the right temperature, yeah we've covered this on more than one occasion. But you have to spend time and watch them. You can't just go by a calendar or a time frame.
That's my opinion on the supplemental heat.
Yeah chickens are definitely not one size fits all or one date fits all. Like Jeff says, you gotta watch those birds. You gotta walk the flock and pay attention to what's going on. And coupled with that question is the next one, what age can chicks be allowed outside? I see that a lot too, I think, and for a lot of the same reasons you, you got to watch your birds.
You gotta pay attention to your birds because incredibly I'll see folks putting baby chicks out that look far too young to be out on pasture. Don't have a mom to give them warrants whenever they need it. Just use good common sense. And I, Jeff, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't that's a big topic of conversation with the pastured poultry people?
It is. And folks that are a little bit further south, Texas, Florida, et cetera. They're going out at two and a half to three weeks. And I would tell you that. Once you feel comfortable that once you've removed the extra heat source and you feel comfortable that the ticks are doing okay I like for them, you don't necessarily force them outside, but you have an access for them to go out and let them acclimate if they're on their own terms. So if you have a doorway or.
Whatever your setup is, let them go out, let them figure it out, let them go out for a half hour, or whatever, hour, and come back in. They need to Whenever you're changing that environment, it's more the environment, they need to do it gradually for our listeners, right? Here with, show birds, heritage birds, et cetera, you have that ability to let that transition to range be different. And each one of those birds is going to be different, right?
You always have that biggest chick, the most mature, right? Stand out. He's going to want to run out the door and explore the entire outside, right? And you're going to have the little itty bitty that, is the run, and it's probably going to be the last one to want to run out. So they're all going to be different. And I wouldn't gather them all up and just plunk them all outside at the same time. I think you're looking for trouble there.
If you can transition them, you're going to be a lot happier.
I know you mentioned the piling earlier but I feel like that first few days outside, that freak thunderstorm, that thing that happens in the middle of the night, that, can you talk about what to watch for a little bit when you first take them out?
Yeah, there's so many things. Anything that causes them stress. Their security or their feeling of security they're going to huddle together. They're going to, group, they're going to want to be one tight group, right? That's where they come from. If we didn't screw them up and we were hen hatching, right? They would all hatch underneath the mom as a group. So they know, that group is security, somewhat instinctual.
So yeah, whether it's a thunderstorm whether it's a dog barking, whatever is stressing them out, that's also going to trigger them to want to pile. It doesn't always mean that they're cold, but it can be other stress factors as well, just like Karen mentioned.
That, and it might be the first time they've been exposed to darkness.
Hopefully not. Hopefully not. If
you're lighting with lights, if you're eating with lights, then
That's true. That's true.
I'm hoping that people are moving over more to a true infrared light. Or an infrared heater, or like a sweeter heater or something like that, Versus, like a high intensity white heat lamp, which are horrible. You put me under a white heat lamp, I'm going to go crazy too it's not.
I think put you under any heat lamp, you'd probably go crazy.
The red ones are okay. If you get the true red glass heat lamp. Okay, but
for chickens or for you? I feel like you might run a little hot.
Yeah, I do run a little hot. You didn't have to bring that up, Karen. This is not the time or place. I
shouldn't call you hot. I apologize.
Thanks. Holy crap. Hey, before we go on to our next question let's pop this question from a viewer up there. Adam's Greenhouse wants to know, Rynek, any way to reverse it and what causes it?
90 percent of the time it's a thiamine deficiency. which is part of the B vitamin family. If you can get a water soluble or a liquid type thiamine if you can get a drop or two into the chick, you have to get it early because once the muscle sets, once it's been rye neck for, a couple of days, the muscles lock up and tense up in that position. It's not, I'm not saying it's impossible.
I'm just saying your likelihood of fixing it after two days It goes down really quickly, but there's a product called it's made by Swanson and it's called Total Bee Liquid. You can look it up. You can get it at Walmart. You can order it on Amazon. I think you just ought to have a couple bottles in the medicine cabinet. And I hope you never have to use them, but, it has a dropper in it. You can put a few drops in the chick's beak.
You can add a dropper full to the chick's, to the group's water, but most of the time it is a thiamine deficiency. People that get carried away with Amprolium or Chord, we'll see more of it because the Coccidiostats or the Amprolium actually is a, I can't say the word, but it basically ties up thiamine which starves the coccidiosis out. That's how its mode of action is.
So if you're going to use Chlorid or an Amprolium product, you may want to actually supplement with additional thiamine to protect yourself over that time. What Karen?
Are you channeling Ingrid? Yeah.
No.
Can conventional coccidiosis treatment like choroid be the cause of brynex? Are you sure you're not channeling Ingrid? No,
I didn't see that,
that was why I was laughing.
That, that was priceless. Yeah. That was priceless. What's our next question on our list here, Karen?
Oops.
Is it? Whoa. Yeah. I jumped ahead on me.
I clicked twice and then I went back.
At what age should I change chicks from starter to grower? And to me, here again, it's one of those things, it's not a hard and fast rule, but at this age, I switch them over. Okay? But Jeff what I'm gonna reserve my thoughts before I get into trouble here. So what's your thoughts? Okay,
so here's the here is the simple rule of thumb for this. Okay, this is the way I tell people so Depending on your breed and how long until It reaches sexual maturity. Like when do you expect to see the first egg? I take that time frame And I divide it into three parts. Okay. So most of the time I'm working with a 24 week old, a lot of your Brahmas and different things will basically be pretty close to laying that first egg at 24 weeks.
So I would want eight weeks on starter, eight weeks on grower. Eight weeks on a developer, right? If I could have it the way it, ought to be the way I was taught, it would be three equal sections, right? You're looking at a 22 starter, a 18 19 percent grower, and a 16. 5 percent or 17 percent developer, right? That's the step down for the protein, and the energy needs to change along the way as well.
So once you're in that developer phase, you do not want a high energy fat building type feed because I don't want internal fat. We want the rest of the body to develop correctly, ovaries, testes, oviduct, all those sort of things.
Anyway that rearing period from chick to, I don't want to say maturity, but sexual maturity, where you might see the first egg, divide that into three, And those are your breakpoints, but still, going along with what Rip's saying, you have to be able to make observations. Are they fully feathered? Are these parts of their body properly developed before you make the change? You can almost put a calendar on it, but then you still have to make the observations. And see where they're at.
This brings us to the end of part one of this topic. We hope you enjoyed listening to this episode and learned some new information. Be sure to join us next week when we bring you part 2 of, From Day Old To First Egg. Thank you for listening to the Poultry Keepers Podcast and we’ll be back next week.