Monday, March 14, 2011

The Chicks Get Their First Treat

The chicks are now about 2 1/2 weeks old. I decided the initial danger hopefully has past, and let Kaia name them. Top left is Hawk, below her is Maru, and to her right is our probable roo, Howell. Directly to "his" right is Chicky-May-May. Above her are Chihiro and then that's Eskaba at the top.
We also decided to give them their first food aside from crumbles. I mixed Earth's Best Organic "spring vegetables and pasta" baby food into crumbles and sprinkles a few more crumbles on top to tempt them. I'd bought a handful of jars of baby food because I wanted some little jars and empties were more expensive. (???) I thought Miss Katalin might like to try them, which she did... and hated them. So, it seemed like a good time to give the chickens a treat! Kaia excitedly presented them with the plate.
...which they inspected...
...and then ran in horror as far away as they could get and started gobbling up their crumbles, in apparent fear that it may all suddenly turn into this strange, green mush!
Well, despite their reaction, we left the plate in overnight to see if they might warm up to it, and the following afternoon it was probably about half gone. I took it out, and we tried again a few days later. They immediately swarmed the plate and devoured it! (Also, look how quickly their feathers are coming in all of a sudden!)
Success!

2 comments:

  1. I've only had my chicks for a little over 24 hours...but they'll only eat the mash I gave them if I leave the room! The gobble it up within minutes though as soon as I leave, lol. I absolutley love reading about your adventures, so inventive too!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you!

    Chicks are so funny... Every time I introduce something new to them, they are *terrified* of it until it has been there for a while. Then it is like they forget it was new and everything is fine.

    Your chicks will probably get used to having treats placed in your brooder pretty quickly and instead start running to them.

    ReplyDelete