Chicken Tips

I had been feeling overwhelmed off and on as I learned more about raising chicks. Chicks are evidently a lot trickier to take care of then grown hens. There is so much advice out there – don’t use shredded newspaper or they’ll slip and die; put rocks in their water dish so they don’t fall in and drown; be sure they have just enough heat the first week, and then back it off by so many degrees every week after. . . . The tips were endless.

This reminded me of my years running a small non-profit. People were always coming up with a new suggestion, great idea, or helpful tip. My approach was to embrace them all. However, often times suggestions simply weren’t practical or made no sense given the size of our staff. So I would sift through these helpful hints, and use what worked for the organization, letting the not-so-helpful tips sink to the bottom.

When it came to raising chicks, I read up plenty, searched the Internet, and talked to lots of chicken owners. I was overloaded with tips just like at the non-profit. Luckily, I’ve had lots of experience sifting through advice!