How do I brood babies?

Quail and chicks and poults are pretty similar. I have done Them together. With the size differences, I would not do it for long tho, a few days will be fine.

Lets start with the harder ones, poults. They like it hot and dry. what happens when you are at the beach? You get sleepy! So do poults, they are all warm and dry and they will sleep the day away and essentially not eat or drink and become weak. Easily remedied tho with chicks. Any chick is fine as long as its active. IF you are hatching poults, and no chicks, consider adding a few eggs in the incubator on day 7 so they hatch together.

Chicks are pretty easy and quail are the easiest.

Brooder set up is similar. I use puppy pads, lots of pros and the only con is it adds to the landfill. Roll it up, toss it and move on. They absorb liquid and this keeps them dry. I put the starter right on the puppy pads in little piles. Quail need special waterers or add rocks to the treys so they don’t drown. I use same waterers for chicks- again you are trying to keep everyone dry. After about 5 days, quail go out on wire in the stacked brooders. Chicks and poults stay on puppy pads for 2-3 weeks. Then I move them out to grow out pens for finishing and I separate them at this point and they go on pine shavings.

Ducks are a whole other ballgame. They come out like a toddler in a food fight. They need their own brooder. Puppy pads in layers or paper towels. They are going to be wet and they need to have their bills in water to eat properly. They can be wet. I am not a fan of putting them on wire but I can sure see the appeal after you have cleaned them up 47x in one day. Good thing they are cute!

Do not put ducks in with any other babies, its a mess waiting to happen and its not healthy for the chicks or poults.

What do I feed my babies?

If you ask the sales person at the store, you will leave with 5 different bags, one for each species and this is unnecessary. I have 2 kinds of starter only. For the quail it is 30% protein. and the others are 18-20% protein. NON-MEDICATED. Ducks and quail cannot have medicated feed and its not necessary and can actually harm them.

Ducklings and chicks are fine on the 18-20% and poults should get a bit more, but don’t stress it. Mix a little quail starter with the chick starter and give it to both. Once the poults are by themselves, give them them a more half and half box of chick starter and quail starter.

All of them should have chick grit available.

Treats- I am personally against treats like greens and last nights spaghetti but you can if you want, no wrong answer, just wait at least a week so they are eating and drinking good. I am against them because they need to grow and I want them eating the food that will grow them. Mealworms, BSFL, BOSS will be ok, not French fries.

What is medicated feed and coccidiosis?

Cocci is an oocyte that lives just about everywhere but really likes damp and warm, who doesn’t? It is a living organism and lives in the dirt and in a bird’s gut. If your start with a clean brooder and the chicks don’t leave said clean brooder, they can’t get coccidiosis unless you bring it to them via hands or clothes or intentionally. The cocci attach to the intestinal lining and suck nutrients away from the bird. Medicated feed and Corrid has amprolium in it which blocks Thyamine uptake with starves the cocci. However, thiamine is necessary for a healthy neurological system in the bird. Now, because I don’t medicate, EVER, there are a few things you can do to have healthy birds and flock. Feed the breeder birds good quality feed and let them be out on the dirt. They build antibodies to what they are exposed to and this is passed on in the egg yolk which is what feeds the babies for the first few days of life. Next, take an egg from a free range chicken of your farm or a neighbors farm, mix the yolk into the feed every few days for extra antibodies. Give plain yogurt for probiotic values. Care for the babies, before you care for the older birds, to not carry anything back to them on hands or clothes. Some well known breeders will take dirt from their coops and put in the brooders to expose the babies. Couple thoughts on this. As breeders, we want the healthiest, most disease resistant stock out there, so expose them and survival of the fittest will prevail. Now, I am not a dirt clod brooder type, but it does have a lot of merit to it. I start with a sterilized brooder to insure they get best start possible but then I only clean up, not sterilize anymore. I roll up puppy pads and put new ones down but no new cleaners. If a bird succumbs to coccidiosis, I dispatch it, I don’t want to keep it in my breeding program, and you as a consumer do not want to buy birds that have been medicated to stay alive.