Incubating and Brooding Chickens - Free 15 page Guide

This is a short guide to incubating and brooding chickens written by one of the most influential men in chicken keeping - James Dryden. It is kind of old but I personally think there is still a lot of value in the 'old ways' - chickens haven't changed all that much and it is certainly interesting to see how things used to be done if nothing else.

'Right Click' and 'Save Target As' to download this pdf to your computer

Chicks and the brooder house

Chicks don't have to be kept inside your house, but they do need to have warmth. A chick being raised naturally by its mother would be kept warm by her sitting on it, but would also be able to wander about and get it's exercise and food/water etc. when it wanted. That is essentially what is intended to be recreated when in the brooder house. I have a short video clip on my website of a brooder house - it's from a really old educational film, but you might find it interesting. You can see from the video clip on my site that in that particular brooder house there is a stove towards the back of their area but also space in front and around the sides so that the chicks can get away from the heat if it is too hot for them.

Caring For Chicks - A Quick Guide To Raising Baby Chicks (Video)

In fact, there are several short video clips dotted around through the chicken section of my website including the growth stages for chicks and also how they hatch out in an incubator. Talking of which, here is a recent news story you might like about a ten year old girl who to decided to try and hatch out some duck eggs bought from Waitrose!