Every other spring, we incubate (or buy) a new batch of baby chicks. Mainly, we raise chickens for eggs and occasionally raise meat chickens as well. Last spring, the baby chicks arrived the first week of April.
It’s SO exciting for the kids to open up the box of peeping baby chicks when they arrive. They peer inside, anxious to see the puffy, fluff balls huddled tightly together for warmth. The chicks have come many miles (about 2,500) and travel through a lot of states by airplane to get to us. The kids anticipate their coming by prepping a box lined with newspaper, along with food and water. They place a heat bulb for warmth above the box.
First, the chicks spend their first few weeks in our house, then get transferred into the nursery portion of the chicken coop. This gives the adult hens time to get to know them through the chicken wire and gives the chicks time to grown. Eventually we’ll put them all together.
This year the breed line up includes: a light brahma, americana (Easter eggers that lay a blue egg), red sex links, 2 meat birds, a welsummer and a barnevelder. We’ve never tried the last 2 breeds, so I’m excited to see how they will do in the rigors of interior Alaska winters.
Alaska Wilderness Mom 