Each winter at Nature’s Hatchery, our customer service staff gets calls from concerned poultry owners who are looking for tips and guidelines on how to successfully keep their poultry through the winter. Although there many questions and concerns, we offer the following advice to cover some of the most frequently asked questions, and help folks tide their birds over until spring production begins.

Winter, although it can be harsh at times, especially in certain parts of the country, should not be detrimental if your flock is prepared and properly monitored. Birds already prepare themselves by cutting back on production, molting (getting in new feathers) and increasing feed consumption. As long as you do your part, your poultry should be just fine.

The general guidelines and specific pointers below are primarily for first-time poultry owners. These pointers contain several little-known facts, recently confirmed by science, about feeding and supplementing your birds with necessary nutrients. While the main part of this information will be most relevant to backyard poultry owners who have small- to medium-sized flocks, the principles laid out here apply whether you have one bird or hundreds.

Starting a Flock

Different age groups of poultry have unique requirements and abilities to survive cold weather. Day-old chicks are the most fragile. One of the most important things to remember when starting a flock in the winter is that the information most hatcheries and books give is often confined to raising chicks in warmer weather. In addition to the guidelines suggested, precautions must be taken for power outages, extreme weather and unexpected circumstances that can arise during the winter. Something minor in warm months, such as a heat lamp failing, could quickly affect your whole flock in colder weather, making it necessary to start over.

We recommend starting with a minimum of two heat lamps for any number of birds. Red-tinted, 250-watt bulbs are best as they produce the most heat but reduce brightness, so they’re not as hard on the chicks’ eyes. A good rule of thumb is to use one heat bulb per thirty chicks, keeping in mind that a backup bulb must always be burning as well, to make up for the occasional failure of a bulb. You can wean the chicks off heat easily by elevating the heat lamps a few inches per week, reducing the temperature by 5 degrees Fahrenheit until the birds are comfortable with the temperature outside. Make the transition over a 10-week period, and the birds should be ready to range outdoors.

Another important thing to remember is to check on the birds as often as possible, with a recommended minimum of three times per day. If birds are cheeping loudly, or huddling in groups, they are most likely too cold. Chicks that remain in the same place or are lethargic usually need immediate care. Try feeding them warm water and placing them under the heat bulbs. Damp or wet patches of bedding should be replaced with new material daily. We have found straw to be the best bedding material. It retains and radiates heat from the bulbs, and can’t be eaten by the chicks.

One of the most important factors in winter brooding is the power supply. A covered brooder is ideal, as it holds the heat in longer than other types if the electricity goes out. But because power failures often occur at night, even a covered brooder couldn’t retain heat for more than a few minutes. One of the best products we have available to help this situation is a unit that plugs into a wall outlet and activates an alarm when the power is off for more than a few seconds. This doesn’t replace checking your brooder or incubator at night, but it’s helpful.

If chicks chill, they often get a condition called “pasting” during which their vents (anuses) becomes blocked with droppings. If caught early enough, you can prevent the chicks from dying by slowly and gently removing the blockage with the help of warm water. This condition can also suggest insufficient water consumption or supply.

Eliminating drafts is another key to success in winter brooding. The best method to prevent drafts is by using a brooder fence (cardboard) two feet or higher. To check for drafts, simply observe the general placement of chicks in the brooder. If they group on one side, you will need to eliminate the drafts coming from the opposite side. Chicks will grow faster and be healthier without drafts.

General Guidelines for Winter Brooding

• Before your shipment of chicks arrives, preheat your brooder for a day, and use only warm or room temperature water for the chicks’ first drink. Cold water can be a shock to their systems (as is the minor stress of shipping) and should be avoided.
• Add Karo syrup or sugar to the water to give the chicks an additional boost and to perk up any droopy chicks. The ratio should be one part sugar, three parts water for waterfowl, and one part sugar, two parts water for chicks.
• Do not raise chicks in outbuildings during the winter, especially for the first four weeks, unless they’ll be kept in a room heated above 70 degrees. Raising chicks outside greatly increases the odds of something going wrong. After their fourth week, they can be moved to a brooder in an outbuilding. They’re past their danger point and have begun their growing stage.
• Do not allow the birds out of their brooder until they’re fully feathered, with no down visible, or are eight to 10 weeks old. If they’re let out, they will need to put all of their energy into growing feathers, rather than growing in size.

Winter Tips for Older Poultry (12 Weeks and Older)

After your birds are 12 weeks old, you should have no further problems relocating them to their permanent coop. At this stage, they should be fully feathered and will look like mature birds, although they may be only half their final size and weight. You can check on these birds as often as you like, but after they have reached this hardy stage, more than two or three times per day shouldn’t be necessary.

You may want to give your birds warm water periodically. Chickens and smaller birds, such as quail, are particularly fond of warm water in cold weather. This is understandable, because it helps them keep warm without using up energy reserves in the process. Water supply is important to successfully raising poultry, especially in winter. If you have access to electricity in your coop, we recommend purchasing a heater or a heated waterer so your birds can enjoy an uninterrupted water supply (more on that later).

Another tip that we often give our customers is to feed scratch grains, especially corn, to their birds in this age group. This shouldn’t replace their regular feed, nor should scratch grains be used in excess, but they are an essential part of a good poultry owner’s feeding routine. We choose corn, because in the digestion process it produces more energy than other grains to keep the bird warm. It also converts into fats, which help insulate the bird against the cold. Chickens, and waterfowl especially, will produce better in the following year if they are slightly fattened the year before. Too much fattening can harm their productivity, but if you keep their weight at 5 to 8 percent more than their normal state in the winter, it can pay off in the number of eggs collected the following spring.

In autumn, check your coop to ensure that it is free of drafts. Fill any cracks and reduce ventilation be to hold heat. Because predators are more likely to view your flock as an easy food source during the winter, make sure that your coop has raccoon-proof latches and all holes are sealed. Weasels and rodents can fit through amazingly small openings!

It’s a good idea to change the bedding in your coop regularly, to prevent accumulation of damp or wet material, which can not only freeze and cause frostbite, but it is unhealthy for the poultry and can be a stress on their immune system. A good cleanout schedule would include at least two short cleanouts per week. (Or consider a deep litter system as an alternative. — MOTHER.)

Because birds that are bred for production never completely stop laying through the winter, keep an eye on the nests during your daily checks. Eggs do not freeze quickly, but to prevent cracking, it’s best to collect them two or three times per day. Keeping your coop lights on for 15-16 hours each day will encourage hens to lay. Following the schedule you choose is crucial. Even a delay of 20 or 30 minutes can affect the birds. Most folks who use this system often employ a simple lamp or appliance timer to keep the schedule accurate. Lighting doesn’t have to be bright, but it shouldn’t be noticeably dim. A 100-watt incandescent bulb or equivalent per 800 square feet is usually sufficient.

Troubleshooting Cold-weather Poultry Problems

Here are a few extra pointers to help prevent common obstacles to successfully keeping poultry through the winter.

Freezing Conditions

A key aspect of raising poultry through the winter is to provide a constant supply of fresh water. Because most folks would rather avoid having to thaw the ice on the waterer several times per day for their birds, heated waterers are becoming popular. Many products are available, but we feel that one of the most versatile is our submersible water warmer. This unit can be used in pans of water, or under your existing waterer, to keep your birds with an uninterrupted supply. If you don’t use a heater, or if you do not have electricity in your coop, ensure that your birds have access to unfrozen water several times per day. Birds should not be left without water for more than a couple of hours at a time.

Frostbite

Frostbite is another common winter issue. Check your birds frequently. Frostbite commonly affects combs in chickens and feet in waterfowl, and can be avoided by keeping bedding clean and dry. The best type of bedding for cold weather is straw, as it holds heat better than any other material.

Contact with snow and ice can contribute to frostbitten feet — if your poultry can’t get away from it. You can solve this by maintaining a spot in your poultry yard covered with at least two inches of straw, large enough for all of your birds to fit comfortably at the same time. This will insulate their feet and provide an escape from the frozen areas.

Chickens’ combs often become frostbitten due to wind chill, rather than ambient temperature. Thaw the affected area with cold water, slowly warming it to room temperature. Then apply a coating of petroleum jelly to isolate it from direct contact with the cold. This treatment may need to be reapplied periodically, but it is usually invaluable, especially for quality show birds. Alternatively, you could hang a radiant or halogen poultry heater just above their head level and they will spend time under it, preventing the need for more involved care. If you are not able to locate any of these heater models, we carry a variety of options that have been tested and work best for us. Coop heaters come in several types, which primarily include hanging and floor models. The types we recommend usually radiate heat downward, but we also make floor heaters that radiate heat outward. These are especially handy for folks with limited headroom in their coops.

Predators

Shortage of food supply causes an increase in predation during the winter months. Losses to predators, such as hawks, raccoons and coyotes, are preventable — as long as a few of their basic behavior patterns are understood, they can easily be thwarted by a little forethought and preparation.

Raccoons are one of the most common predators. They are nocturnal, and can be the worst of the proverbial “fox in the henhouse,” sometimes killing, seemingly for sport, the majority of a flock in a single night. They normally work to gain access to your coop, rather than finding and enlarging a hole. They will remove loose boards or roof shingles, open simple latches (such as hook and eye) and reach through small holes to gain access to your coop. They have been known to be strong enough to tear chicken wire, and similar deterrents usually do not stop them. The best way to handle a raccoon problem is to secure the poultry housing and to be present if they begin to target your coop. Trapping can be effective.

Weasels and minks are harder to stop. They can fit into small openings and are hard to deter. Like raccoons, they usually kill in nighttime rampages that seem more for sport than food. But these creatures are relatively rare and often too timid to come near civilization.

Coyotes are easier to keep out due to their size and limitations. Simple fences will often take care of this problem, although they can burrow under them. A line of electrified wire near the top and bottom of the fence will keep them from digging or jumping over your fences. Coyotes work in groups or alone at any time of the day or night, and are capable of capturing birds as large as turkeys. Simple prevention in the fall will eliminate these predators for the rest of the year.

Hawks aren’t limited by fences and normally do not try to gain access to the coop. Most often, they snatch birds in daylight while foraging. There is really no better way to protect your birds from these aerial predators than to raise geese with them, or to set up bird netting on the tops of your pens. Hawks usually take only one bird at a time and leave only feathers behind as evidence.

There are many products on the market designed to deter these predators. One of the most effective for night predators is the Sentry, a motion activated LED light that senses predators from a distance and flashes on for a few seconds, often scaring them away permanently.

If you are not sure which type of predators you have in your area, check the tracks around your place or use a field guide to determine the source of the problem and the best course of action. Local water sources are a good place to look for tracks.

General guidelines and summary

Even though most backyard flocks are commonly out in harsh conditions during the winter, they are quite hardy and, if cared for properly, will make it through without any difficulty, resuming production in the spring.

Rats and mice may be your biggest problems. Not only do they carry disease, but they invariably leave contaminated droppings that eventually wind up in your bird’s diets after they get into the feed. It’s best to store feed in metal containers, such as new trash cans, to keep mice and other critters out. Feed left in bags unprotected will most certainly be taken advantage of by populations of smaller rodents. Wooden or plastic containers usually keep these pests out for only a short time.

Occasionally putting a vitamin-electrolyte supplement in water can help keep your poultry healthy. Even commercially prepared feeds cannot replace the green forage available in warmer months, and supplements help temporarily restore the natural balance. In conjunction with the fattening mentioned above, this type of feed program will usually ensure top productivity — as soon as spring comes again. We can’t too strongly emphasize the basic principles of proper feeding and monitoring during the winter. In warm months, birds can take care of themselves to a greater degree, but the cold season in many areas is a time of survival for poultry. If you are aiming for top production and healthy birds, taking care of them properly will reduce problems in the future.

An important aspect of this is to give your birds appropriate (broiler, production, or maintenance) feed that is full strength — no scratch grain added. Scratch feeds can be used as outlined above, but it cannot replace the proper feed schedule. If your feed store does not have a good variety of feeds, you should provide unmedicated feed to your birds and feed only the appropriate rations to certain groups. For example, chicks should get chick starter or broiler feed up to their twelfth week, ducklings should be started on a waterfowl starter-grower or broiler feed until their sixth month, and birds that are laying or past their sixth month should get either a layer feed or breeder ration. Mature birds can be put on a maintenance ration through the winter.

Check on your birds to observe any inconsistencies or irregularities. If you listen to your birds, you should not hear heavy breathing, wheezing or coughing. Limping birds should be isolated until they are ready to go back with the rest of your flock. Ideally, keep a notebook handy to jot notes and keep records of feed consumption, weights, water shortages and miscellaneous occurrences. The more accurate and complete your notes are, the better you will be able to foresee problems the next time.

If your birds become ill, your local county agricultural extentionists usually have great information. They often give advice that is just as good as a vet’s, and will know when to refer you to one.

Winter illnesses are rarely significant but can become problematic if left unattended. The standard procedures for treatment of illness include quarantining the bird and using a broad-spectrum antibiotic, such as Terramycin, in feed or water, depending on which type of antibiotic you have. But this is only necessary when simply warming the affected bird is not sufficient to restore its normal hardy nature.

Winter should not be a problem for your flock, but rather a steppingstone to the following year! Just don’t forget to check on the birds!

We’ve completed the Community Chickens projects for 2009. It’s been a great experience to test incubators, feed and equipment. We’ve had fun hatching a variety of eggs and raising all sorts of poultry.

Here’s a quick overview of some of the things I’ve learned throughout the process:

Shipping hatching eggs significantly reduces the hatch rate, but it’s still a great way to get the type of birds you want. (What to Expect When Purchasing Shipped Hatching Eggs).

Storing eggs reduces the number of chicks that will hatch from them. (How to Improve Hatch Rates and Tips on Hatching Eggs and Starting Baby Chicks from an Expert)

Using incubators that frequently turn eggs and precisely control temperate and humidity improve hatch rates significantly. (Improve Hatch Rates with the Right Incubator and Incubating Duck Eggs Successfully)

Using broody hens to raise a few chicks is a great idea — but you have to work in the dark to make things work smoothly. (Using a Foster Broody Hen to Raise Chicks)

Even if you don’t have room for chickens, quails are lots of fun, and productive egg layers. (Keeping Quails: Newly Hatched Baby Quails and Keeping Quails: Gender Differentiation)

Sharing the experience of processing meat birds fosters a sense of community and encourages reflection in ways you might not expect. (Processing Broiler Chickens and Chicken Processing at Home Reinforces Feelings for Processing Meat Myself)

We’ll continue to share what we’re learning about poultry and community in future blogs here and on Grit.com.

I’ve been using a small backyard chicken coop, the Back Porch Chicken Coop from GardenEggs.com, for the last several months. It’s housed a cockerel and three pullets that aren’t quite old enough to be laying eggs yet. The bottom of this backyard chicken coop is wire mesh to allow in fresh air. The mesh pattern isn’t quite large enough for droppings to fall through. Adding some wood chips or other bedding makes cleanout easier.

I’ve also used this portable chicken coop to hold two broody hens until they accepted some broiler chicks. (Read Using a Foster Broody Hen to Raise Chicks.) In this situation, I lined the bottom of the coop with feed bags and covered the bags with wood chips. The hens fit nicely behind the roost, so you could easily build a nest into one corner if you want to keep a few laying hens in this coop.

This small chicken coop is light enough to be moved easily by two people, though it’s not on wheels, and the design concept is simple. If you allow your hens to range during the day, this is a nice little coop for keeping them safe and dry at night.

Photos by Troy Griepentrog

I’ve been telling people for quite a while: Real environmentalists eat white chicken eggs. That’s because white-egg layers are almost always more feed efficient: Hens that lay white eggs are lighter weight and eat less feed to produce the same amount of eggs as brown-egg layers. So, brown chicken eggs require more resources to produce.

Here’s an Example

Hy-Line is a large poultry genetics corporation. Their website says that Hy-Line W-36 hens (the “world’s most efficient egg layer,” according to the site) consume 1.82 pounds of feed to produce a pound of eggs (white eggs). Hy-Line Brown hens eat 2.02 pounds of feed to produce a pound of eggs (brown eggs).

For reference, a dozen large eggs weighs about a pound and a half. So if your family eats 50 dozen eggs a year, it would take 15 pounds less feed to produce the same amount of white chicken eggs as brown chicken eggs. (See calculations below.) Multiply that by all the families that eat brown eggs, and we could produce much less grain to produce the same amount of chicken eggs.

Then, I watched this video:

Whether we eat conventional, industrial brown chicken eggs or conventional, industrial white chicken eggs, the male chicks of these egg-laying strains are destroyed at the hatchery because they’re not good meat-producing birds — they’re inefficient at converting feed to meat.

I’m not prepared to become a vegan, for a bunch of reasons I won’t mention here. So, what’s a meat-eating environmentalist to do? Buy eggs from a farmer who raises dual-purpose heritage breeds. Heritage breeds aren’t as specialized as commercial breeds of egg-layers. They’re pretty good at producing eggs and pretty good at producing meat, so raising the males for meat and the females to produce eggs makes sense — without discarding half the chicks.

Some of these heritage breeds lay white eggs and some lay brown eggs, but the biggest factor is management. It’s time to start telling people that egg color doesn’t matter. Real (omnivorous) environmentalists eat pastured poultry from heritage-breed, free-range production systems.

Using pasture farming methods, giving the birds room to roam, access to sunshine and all the bugs and seeds they can eat (in addition to necessary supplemental feed), produces the most healthful eggs and meat. And, if heritage chicken breeds are involved, you can enjoy the eggs knowing that half the birds weren’t simply discarded.

For more information on egg labels and the benefits of pasture farming methods, read Free Range vs. Pastured: Chicken and Eggs and The Amazing Benefits of Grass-fed Meat.

Calculations

50 dozen eggs x 1.5 pounds = 75 pounds of eggs

75 pounds of eggs x 2.02 pounds of feed = 151.5 pounds of feed to produce brown chicken eggs for your family for a year

75 pounds of eggs x 1.82 pounds of feed = 136.5 pounds of feed to produce white chicken eggs for your family for a year

151.5 – 136.5 = 15 pounds of feed saved

Few experiences in life compare to the wondrous event of witnessing a baby chicken labor with instinctive determination and emerge from an egg. Being a spectator of this miraculous event is the motivation that prompts many people to attempt incubating and hatching eggs. Regardless of the reasons behind your decision, knowing what to reasonably expect when purchasing shipped hatching eggs can make your experience more pleasurable and helps to ease potential disappointment.

When discussing shipped hatching eggs with an individual, I always remind them of the risk involved when purchasing eggs and the difference between an infertile egg and a nonviable egg.

Shipped hatching eggs may travel a great distance and experience excessive variations in climate, including temperature, humidity and pressure changes that may occur with fluctuations in altitude. These conditions, coupled with the possibility of simple human carelessness when handling the package, can decrease the likelihood of a successful hatch.

Because of these factors, a fertile and viable egg can be packed into a box, shipped to you and arrive in a nonviable state. When candling the eggs, nonviable eggs appear clear, just as infertile eggs do. When cracked open upon completion of incubation, you can see by close visual inspection that these nonviable eggs were fertile and became nonviable from exposure to extreme conditions.

So, why would a person accept the risk and purchase shipped hatching eggs when they understand that there is a possibility the eggs may not hatch? There are a variety of reasons:

• The minimum order requirement for baby chicks from hatcheries is 25 chicks (too many for some people to manage).
• A particular breed may only be available from an individual breeder who doesn’t ship live chicks.
• Ordering hatching egg, instead of live chicks, may be more affordable.

Incubating eggs that have been shipped through the mail can be and is successful for countless people just like you everyday. With simple preparation and correct incubation techniques, you can successfully hatch your own chicks.

To increase your chances for success, clean and turn on your incubator a couple of days prior to the arrival of your hatching eggs. Be certain that your incubator is maintaining proper, consistent temperature and humidity for the kind of eggs you are hatching and for your type of incubator. Still air units will require a slightly different temperature than forced air units (follow the manufacturer’s instructions).

When your eggs arrive, carefully unwrap the eggs and inspect them. Discard any broken or cracked eggs and notify your supplier of the damage. If the eggs are very dirty, a light and gentle rinsing under water will not harm them. Place the eggs to be incubated pointy end down into an egg carton or egg-hatching tray at room temperature for 24 hours prior to placing them in your preheated incubator. This “resting” period can greatly increase your chances of a successful hatch by allowing the air cell within the egg to settle back into proper position. This resting period is the same if you are using a broody hen as your incubator.

Acquiring hatching eggs has never been easier. The resources are vast and hatching eggs can be found everywhere from online auction sites to websites that specialize in the sale of hatching eggs.

Incubating your own hatching eggs can be very rewarding and enjoyable. Understanding and accepting the reality that even the most experienced person has unsuccessful hatches occasionally, will help avoid the disappointment that we each have felt at times from a failed attempt at hatching shipped eggs. The successful hatches far outweigh the latter. Proper technique and perseverance will reward you with an incubator full of peeping chicks.

Julie and Michael Gabbard own and run Gabbard Farms.

Our final chicken egg incubation test for the Community Chickens project is complete. We set eggs from Gabbard Farms in a Brinsea Octagon 20 Eco and Brinsea Mini Advance. I had great success incubating duck eggs in the Octagon Eco and wanted to see how the Mini would compare.

We received eggs of three breeds of white-egg layers: Golden Penciled Hamburgs, Silver Spangled Hamburgs and Appenzeller Spitzhaubens. Overall, 75 percent of the eggs were fertile. That’s good this time of year. Usually, fertility starts to drop in April or May and hits a low point between June and August (this varies depending on your location and climate). The eggs we set were laid in July, so fertility levels above 70 percent are perfectly acceptable. And I didn't open the eggs that were "clear" when I candled them, so more may have been fertile. Shipping eggs lowers the hatch rate, too.

Once again, the Brinsea incubators performed above expectations. All six of the fertile eggs in the Mini hatched (100 percent), and 15 of the 17 fertile eggs in the Octagon Eco hatched (88 percent hatch rate). Overall hatch rates, not accounting for fertility, were 62.5 percent for the Octagon Eco and 85.7 percent for the Mini.

And the incubators were easy to operate. Both incubators have automatic turning, and I set the Mini to turn eggs every hour for a fair comparison. The Mini can be set to turn eggs as frequently as every 45 minutes. Turning the eggs during incubation prevents the embryos from sticking to the shells and exercises the chicks. (See How to Improve Hatch Rates.)

The digital features of the Mini Advance make it a bit easier to set and operate, plus the range of options is a little broader than for the Octagon Eco. But you can buy a digital version of the Octagon Eco, too. It’s called the Octagon 20 Advance, and digital humidity display is a wonderful feature of the Octagon Advance. Humidity is such an important part of good incubation, and other methods of determining humidity levels are not precise.

If you’re planning to hatch a small number of eggs (such as in a classroom setting or as part of a small backyard poultry hobby), the Mini Advance is a great choice. You can see the eggs and hatching chicks just a bit better in this model. If you want to hatch a few more eggs at a time (up to 24 chicken eggs), buy the Octagon Eco or Advance. The value of more healthy, live chicks per hatch easily makes up for the cost difference between these incubators and the small Styrofoam incubators.

We’ve been hatching eggs in incubators for more than 12 years, and my wife’s comment sums it all up: “Using these incubators makes hatching eggs much more fun. More chicks hatch, and they don’t need help hatching.”

Here are the some photos of the two-day-old chicks.

Golden Penciled Hamburg chicks

Silver Spangled Hamburg chicks

Appenzeller Spitzhauben chicks

All the chicks in our GQF brooder. We put paper towels over the wire floor for the first few days so we can scatter feed on the floor until the chicks learn where the feeders are.

Photos by Troy Griepentrog

In my previous post, you were introduced to my new adventures in quail raising. To catch you up, I now have three coturnix (also known as Japanese) quails, one male and two females (Bebee, Doug and Skeeter, respectively).

Unlike chickens, which can take as long as six months to begin laying, quails will lay, at the earliest, at six weeks of age. One of my females, Skeeter, began laying at six weeks one day and has steadily produced an egg a day since. The other female, Doug, has not yet begun, but this isn’t unusual for seven weeks.

This fast-laying nature, and the normally calm disposition of the quail coupled with its relatively small need for space, makes it ideal for raising in an urban environment. Plus, they produce more eggs per/amount of feed than any chicken.

Quails are also a great urban addition, because it's easy to quickly determine their sex, which is helpful if you want fertile eggs to hatch, or if you want as many layers (females) as possible. While chicken roosters would be a nuisance (and maybe a citation) in any urban environment, quail roosters are much calmer and, outside of some coloring variations and a unique “call,” are relatively similar to the females.

These images show the differences in coloration between the male and the female, the females being the birds on either end in the photo above (Left image, left quail: female), (right image, right quail: female). Females have spotted, light-colored breasts, while the male's breast lacks spots (for the most part) and has a rusty color, similar to a robin. The males also have a darker, rusty coloration to their face, around the eyes.

To read more about my quail-raising adventures, visit part one in my series, "Meet my Pet Quails."

Photos by Taylor Miller 

Bob Berry owns Bob’s Biddies, a small hatchery that specializes in Rhode Island Red and Dominique chickens in Ray City, Ga. Berry hatches 1,000 Rhode Island Red chicks and 500 Dominique chicks each month throughout the year. About 85 percent of the eggs he incubates hatch. We talked with Berry to ask his advice on incubating eggs.

How did you get started in the hatchery business?

When I was a youngster, we always raised a lot of chickens. Some were sold as grown chickens, and we sold eggs, too. I’ve always had a love for chickens. Taking care of them was part of my daily chores.

My professional career took me a different route. When I had to retire, my wife Diane and I tried to come up with something that I could do while she’s at work. I decided to start working with poultry again .Because I have physical limitations, the hatchery venture seemed to make sense.

Why did you choose to specialize in Rhode Island Reds and Dominiques?

We tried other breeds. But the Rhode Island Reds and Dominiques are old breeds that most people are familiar with. Both breeds are great egg-layers.

What are the most important things to remember when incubating eggs?

Other than temperature, humidity is the most important thing. Keep it between 58 and 62 percent for the first 18 days of incubation. Increase humidity the three days prior to hatching.

Turning of the eggs frequently is also important.

There's no need to turn eggs while they're in storage prior to putting them in the incubator, but store them at 52 to 58 degrees Fahrenheit.

Don't wash eggs if you plan to incubate them.

Keep good records and calendar reminders, too. I move hatching eggs from the incubator to a hatcher unit a few days before they hatch. If you keep eggs in the incubator too long and they hatch while it is still in the rotation mode, you end up with a big mess. I’ve miscalculated days and speak from experience.

Do have any advice for starting chicks that come in the mail?

Just before a chick hatches, it absorbs the last part of the egg yoke, which allows the chick to survive the first three days without water or food. So, there’s only a small window of time to work with. I tell all of my customers to start the chicks on sugar water as soon as the chicks arrive — and keep them on this for the first two weeks. I have used this method for a long time, and it has proved itself. I also advise customers to get a good chick starter feed or a combination starter/grower.

In Don’t Count Your Chickens Before They Hatch, I wrote that there are pros and cons to both natural incubation (broody hens) and artificial incubation (using electric incubators). One of my broody hens left a nest of eggs, and the electricity was out for a while. But there’s good news, too.

Although the temperature in the electric incubator dropped to 90 degrees Fahrenheit, 12 of the 35 pheasant eggs still hatched. That’s a 34 percent hatch rate. It wasn’t a total loss.

After the broody hen left the nest, I put them under a different broody and none of them hatched. (OK, that’s not good news.) But another broody did a great job and hatched seven of the nine eggs she was sitting on — a 78 percent hatch rate. Even if you average the two hens, that’s still a 39 percent hatch rate.

Of the 214 pheasant eggs we were incubating in the GQF 1202A incubator, 86 chicks hatched (40 percent). Because we wanted to set all the eggs at one time, we stored 152 of the hatching eggs for four days before them in the incubator. About 44 percent of the fresh eggs hatched. Only 39 percent of the eggs hatched from the group that was stored longer. All the eggs were shipped to us through the mail, so none were perfectly fresh.

We also didn’t turn 42 of the eggs for the first six days of incubation. This was a test to see how not turning the eggs would affect hatch rates. About 42 percent of the eggs that were turned more frequently hatched. They were turned automatically every four hours from the second day of incubation through the fifteenth day of incubation. Only 33 percent of the eggs that weren’t turned as frequently hatched. I stopped turning all the eggs about eight days before they hatched because I was going to be out of the office. Normally, I’d stop turning the eggs only three days before they’re supposed to hatch.

This was a limited test, but the advice of most experts to turn eggs frequently and not store them before incubation seems to be accurate. If you store eggs or don’t turn them, you can expect lower hatch rates. We also noticed several chicks with leg problems. Although this could be genetic, most likely the problems were due to infrequent turning of the eggs and storing the eggs too long.

Meet Porkchop the coturnix quail (also known as Japanese quail). At the time this photo was taken, she was two weeks old. I think I should tell you, I have a colorful personality, a heart of gold when it comes to my animals and a knack for listing priorities others might call … off. So, when the team at MOTHER EARTH NEWS entrusted me with the care of four baby quails to participate in the Community Chickens project, the first thing I did was to name them: Doug, Beebe, Skeeter and Porkchop — all characters in the ’90s Nick cartoon, Doug (whose superhero alter-ego was, Quailman).

Each is identifiable by characteristic markings and personalities: Doug is the outcast who likes to be held. Skeeter is the squeeky one who hates being held. Beebe is the non-descript one who is afraid of being without Skeeter. And Porkchop is the fat, lazy one who plops down in the center of the food to eat and falls asleep on her back.

Having said all that, let’s not front: I know nothing about raising poultry; I never even had a cockatiel. But that’s the beauty of this project: People of all skill levels can come together to "new-fashion" sustainability and learn from each other. And for me, that starts with eggs. Tiny, speckled eggs.

Of 24 such quail hatching eggs sent by Purely Poultry, only four cracked open, and so they all came home with me. The night before they hatched, I set up a circular brooder with an infrared heat lamp, newspaper shreds, a water dish filled with rocks (so they wouldn’t drown), and game-bird starter food.

I had heard that quails are the wildest birds this side of Hitchcock, so my greatest determination was to have the calmest quails known to man. And because I take photos for a living, I was afraid these quails would be camera-shy. So, you can imagine my surprise when they were not only tame during the photo shoot, but downright "posey." Again, these shots were taken when they were two weeks old.

Can’t you just read their personalities through the pictures? Try to guess which is which, and find the answers by clicking the "comments" link below. And while you’re there, let me know what you think!

Click here for Part II in my series, Quail Keeping: Gender Differentiation.

Update: I lost poor Porkchop three weeks into the project when her leg was caught on the brooder cage and snapped. It was a great tragedy, a terrible accident, and I was devastated, to say the least. As I held my bleeding bird, wrapped in a warm towel, a few of my friends tried to find me a vet, and although I live in a somewhat metropolitan area, no clinics were prepared to handle a quail, and Porkchop had to suffer because of it. I did not want Porkchop to be in pain, however, and so my vet offered to put her down. She died on the way to the clinic. 

Shake your quail feathers, she will be missed. <3

Photos by Taylor Miller 

Who can resist estimating or daydreaming about how many of the eggs in the incubator or under a broody hen will hatch? Hatching eggs is certainly exciting and fun.

For the Community Chickens project, we have 152 pheasant eggs from MacFarlane Pheasants and 62 from Oakwood Game Farm (a total of 214 eggs) in the GQF 1202A incubator. As a little experiment, I didn’t turn 42 of the eggs for the first six days. They were in the hatching tray instead of the trays that are turned automatically.

Most books recommend turning the eggs at least three times per day from the second day of incubation until about three days before the expected hatch date. Turning the eggs prevents the embryos from sticking to the shells and makes chicks stronger by giving them exercise. Some people I’ve spoken with say that turning eggs doesn’t increase hatch rates or health of chicks at all. The pheasant eggs should hatch late next week. I’ll share the results with you.

So that we don’t have all our pheasant eggs in one incubator, I also have 35 eggs in the Brinsea Octogon 20 Eco in my basement. Yesterday when I came home from work, an electrical breaker had flipped, and the incubator wasn’t getting electricity. The eggs had cooled below 90 degrees Fahrenheit. I’m not sure how long they were chilled, but I hope the eggs were far enough into the incubation (two weeks) that some of the embryos will still survive.

I also have two broody chicken hens setting on nine eggs each. This morning when I opened the crate to water one of them, she left the nest. Sometimes a broody hen will do this just to stretch, eat and defecate. Other times she’ll leave for good. She didn’t return to the nest after about 15 minutes, so I put her eggs under another broody hen that was setting on two infertile eggs. I left the infertile eggs for the hen that left the nest, just in case she returns.

Between an electricity outage and an unreliable broody hen, I many not get any chicks or pheasant chicks at home. Then again, you never know. There’s no point in trying to count them now — until they’ve hatched.

Chickens and other fowl have played a large role in history. The first book in the United States that was dedicated entirely to poultry was The American Poultry Book, published in 1843. You can find that historic book and over 1,000 others at the Leonora Hering Memorial Poultry Collection on the campus of Kansas State University.

You don’t have to be a student to access this special collection. Anyone can use the books for research 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday. People come from around the world to read these books, which cover more than U.S. poultry. The collection includes an original copy of Aldrovandi's work on ornithology (this link is to a German site, but it has scanned pages of the original books) published in the early 17^th century in Latin. One volume focuses on poultry. If your Latin is a little rusty, you can read the English translations in the collection.

The library would like to add to the collection, as the donor, Lenora Hering, stopped collecting in the 1980s. For example, if you happen to have an original 1886 copy of The Book of Hamburgs by L. Frank Baum (yep, he wrote more than the Wizard of Oz) the library would gladly accept it.

To find out what’s available before making the trip, search the online catalog. If you’re looking for something special, Roger Adams, the librarian, can help you find it.

Photo by Troy Griepentrog

Five chicks (from the Community Chickens project) hatched late (on a Saturday). They needed a little extra attention, and my wife Sue and I had them in a homemade brooder. The following Tuesday, we noticed that one of our hens didn’t roost at night, but stayed on the nest. That’s a good sign the hen was broody, or “clucking,” as my family used to say.

My mind started to race: What kind of eggs could we give that old cluck hen to hatch?

But Sue had a better idea: Let’s see if the broody hen would foster the five chicks we had in the brooder. I had recently read about Gwen Roland using a broody hen to raise some broiler chickens (Raising Chickens for Meat: Do-it-yourself Pastured Poultry).

On Wednesday morning while it was still dark outside, I moved the broody hen to a secluded box to see if she’d continue to cluck. I left two eggs for her, and she was setting tightly — fluffing up to look intimidating when I’d check on her. By Friday night, I was satisfied that she was committed to the project.

Saturday morning (so I’d have more time to watch the results), I took the chicks from the brooder box — again before sunrise — and tucked them under the old cluck hen’s wings. Although they’d been under a heat lamp for a week, they seemed to sense the hen’s warmth and nestled right in.

The broody hen immediately gathered the chicks, keeping them under her wings. She seemed a little confused by their activity throughout the day and didn’t really want to get off the eggs. In the evening, I removed the eggs. (There were three eggs. She must have laid one more the day I moved her to seclusion.)

Sunday afternoon, I moved the hen and chicks to a small portable coop. The chicks are doing well with their foster mother, and we’re happy to have one less brooder to box to manage during this busy summer.

Photo by Troy Griepentrog

As I mentioned in Which Poultry Hatching Eggs are in Which Incubator?, I had been incubating duck eggs (20 Golden 300 Hybrid eggs) in a Brinsea Octagon 20 Eco poultry incubator. In my old Styrofoam incubator, I had another 20 Golden 300 eggs and 12 Pekin duck hatching eggs. I’ve been using my old incubator for 12 years and wanted to see how the Octagon compared. Which would be the best incubator?

The Octagon 20 won the competition easily: 18 of the 20 eggs hatched! A 90 percent hatch rate is absolutely remarkable. It’s also amazing that all of the eggs were fertile — the parent flock must have been managed nearly perfectly.

I’ve never been so successful hatching duck eggs or any other eggs. We may have had a 95 percent hatch if I hadn’t cracked one egg slightly when returning it to the incubator after candling it.

Of the 32 eggs in my Styrofoam incubator, I removed seven eggs during candling. They were either clear or had a blood ring in them, which means the embryo started to develop and died. One of the Golden 300 eggs from this group was clear, so I assume it was infertile. One duckling died during hatching, and five eggs didn’t hatch at all. That’s about a 60 percent hatch rate overall — about what I’d normally expect from this incubator using eggs received in the mail.

Both incubators were in my basement, where the temperature and humidity were consistent. But the temperature in the old incubator fluctuated about 6 degrees at various times, and because I don’t have an automatic turner in it, I only turned the eggs once each day. The automatic turner on the Octagon turned the eggs every hour.

Keeping the temperature consistent and turning the eggs frequently seem to have made a huge difference. If you’re thinking about buying a small incubator, I recommend the Brinsea Octagon 20. I’m thoroughly impressed by it.

Duckling photo: Matthew T. Stallbaumer

Incubator photo: Courtesy Brinsea

The Community Chickens project is at an eggciting stage: the incubators are filled with a variety of poultry hatching eggs. We’re hatching a bunch of eggs so that people in our office can try raising a few chickens, ducks or quail. You might be interested to know exactly what we’re hatching and in what kind of incubators, so here’s the list.

In the office, we have a GQF 1202A Sportsman incubator provided by Sure Hatch. It’s loaded with 222 chicken eggs!

20 Golden Comet eggs from Ridgway Hatchery
24 Brown egg layer eggs from Moyers Chicks
90 Dominique and 40 Rhode Island Red eggs from Bob Berry Hatchery
24 Buff Orpington and 24 Silkie eggs from Ideal Poultry

These are divided into three separate hatch dates. Plus, we have 13 Coturnix quail eggs from Purely Poultry. Most people would not recommend mixing different types of poultry hatching eggs in an incubator, but we had some leftover quail eggs, and I couldn’t make myself throw out viable hatching eggs.

In a Brinsea Octagon 20 Eco incubator, I have 20 Golden 300 duck eggs from Metzer Farms. I have another 20 Golden 300 eggs, plus 12 Pekin duck eggs from Hoffman Hatchery, in my old Styrofoam incubator. I’ve used that old incubator for about 12 years. It was originally a still-air model, but over the years, I’ve added a fan and replaced the thermostat.

Compared to my old incubator, the Octagon keeps the temperature remarkably stable. And although I’ve always enjoyed the hands-on experience of turning eggs, the automatic turning feature of the Octagon is a real time-saver. The duck eggs are about half way through the incubation process. So far, I’m really impressed with the Octagon.

Helen has 12 White Silkie eggs and  24 assorted bantam eggs from Meyer Hatchery in a still-air incubator from Murray McMurray Hatchery.

In a Brinsea Octagon 20 Advance incubator, Hank has the 20 duck eggs from Ridgway Hatchery. Jim has another 15 duck eggs in a turbo fan incubator from Stromberg’s Chicks and Gamebirds.

Kate has 20 Golden 300 Hybrid duck eggs from Metzer Farms and 22 Pekin duck eggs from Hoffman Hatchery in a Brower Top Hatch incubator.

Connie has 12 Pharoah/Coturnix quail eggs from Purely Poultry in a Brinsea R-Com incubator.

Look for hatch results in future blogs!

What’s the new Community Chickens project all about? It’s about sharing the joy of keeping poultry and spreading the knowledge to help people successfully raise chickens, ducks and other fowl.

Cheryl Long, the editor in chief of Mother Earth News, and Hank Will, the editor of our sister publication, Grit, keep flocks of chickens. So do Bryan Welch, the publisher of both magazines, and a few other people around the office. We had several poultry-related products that we planned to test and write about. Then, Hank had a great idea. Why not write about the whole life cycle of chickens (and other poultry) as it’s happening — egg to table — and share the experience with our readers? (Great idea, Hank!)

The Community Chickens website serves as a resource for poultry information. As part of our commitment to poultry enthusiasts everywhere, we will be hatching eggs, trialing incubators, brooding chicks, raising and processing broilers and writing articles and reports that chronicle our efforts every step of the way. Our goal is to get more people raising poultry for food, fun, pest control and profit.

“Community chickens” could mean a lot of things. In some neighborhoods, people take turns caring for the chickens: Someone opens the coop in the morning; another person gathers eggs during the day; someone else may feed chickens. Everyone shares the responsibility — and the eggs. If responsibilities are clearly defined, that's a great idea for the right group of people. But our project is about bringing information to the community of people who are interested in raising poultry. 

We have a broody hen that’s been sitting on eggs for three weeks. Today should be hatch day! For the last few days, though, she’s been off the nest quite a lot. The eggs look dirty. And much of the time she’s simply hovering over them — even standing on them. She still seems broody, though, so I’m not quite sure what’s going. (It’s been quite a while since I’ve used a broody to hatch eggs.) Two things come to mind: 1) The chicks in the eggs are creating enough heat that the hen doesn’t need to sit right on them all the time, or 2) something is wrong with the broody hen and she’s not going to pull off this hatch. I’ll write an update on that next week. In the mean time, share your thoughts on this in the comments section below.

Next week, the Community Chickens project will be off to an exciting start. Duck eggs will be arriving for us to use in our incubator tests. Metzer Farms will be sending 60 Golden 300 Hybrid eggs. We’re getting 35 Pekin duck eggs from Hoffman Hatchery. And Ridgway Hatcheries is sending an assortment of duck eggs.

I’ve been hoping to try a few of the Golden 300 Hybrid ducks for some time. They’re supposed to be excellent egg layers and calmer than Khaki Campbell ducks. A bonus for our project is that the male ducklings are shades of black; the females, shades of brown. We’ll be able to determine the gender of the ducklings easily. (Because they’re hybrids, this characteristic doesn’t continue in future generations.)

Duck eggs can be a challenge to hatch, so this will be a good test of the incubators. Duck and goose eggs require more humidity during incubation than chicken eggs. Another challenge is the wait! The duck eggs will take 28 to hatch (instead of just 21 for chickens).

The Community Chickens project is about to begin! Mother Earth News and our sister publication, Grit, are working together to test and tell you about all sorts of things related to poultry. Over the next few months, we’ll write about incubators, a brooder, feeders and waterers, fencing and feed.

We plan to hatch chicken, duck, guinea and turkey eggs, and we’ll share our experiences raising the babies. As always, we’ll provide information on alternative and time-tested methods. (See Furry and Feathered Friends Welcome on Grit’s website for photos of a broody hen and the chicks she hatched.)

While we’re waiting for the hatching eggs to arrive, I’ve set up the poultry box brooder from GQF Manufacturing. (I still need to install the light bulbs and remove some of the protective plastic from shipping.) It’s important to be ready for chicks when they arrive.

PHOTO BY TROY GRIEPENTROG

I’m looking forward to trying out the brooder. It should be easy to clean and make taking care of the new chicks easy. In the past, I’ve used various types of homemade brooders, including cardboard boxes with a small board across the top to suspend a heat lamp from. That works for a few birds for a short time, but it’s important to make sure the cardboard doesn’t get too warm and create a fire hazard.

A new website for the Community Chickens project will be live early next week. That site will give you easy access to all the information about the project, plus great tips on raising poultry. Check back for a link to that site.