# When to start feeding chicks scraps?



## kdelbiondo (Jun 9, 2015)

Hi all!! I'm raising 6 chicks for the first time in my life (yay) and I'm wondering when it is okay to start feeding them fruit and veggie scraps? They are two weeks old right now...thanks!


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## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

Right now they need every bit of the nutrition they're getting from their feed to grow and produce feathers. And since their GI tracts are still those of babies, other treats could throw them off. I did introduce iceberg lettuce to mine when they were about a month old but nothing else. That all came later once they were old enough to be totally on their own.


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## sswanee17 (May 17, 2015)

Kdelblondo, I have a broody with four chicks. She introduced her checks to the rest of the flock on day number two. I can't keep my chicken separated from the chicks. If I get the medicated chick starter for them everybody eats it and vice versa the chicks eat everything that the adults have. The checks have already had cracked corn, bread, yesterday they had watermelon, and I have no control over them. I just give up on it and don't even worry about it and my chicks look fine and they r nice healthy little birds. That's the way it is when you have a broody and they want to get those babies out into the world. I guess I'll just cross my fingers that they're all healthy.


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## kdelbiondo (Jun 9, 2015)

*Thanks!!*

Thanks so much! Hearing your feedback helped


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## zamora (May 26, 2015)

sswanee17 said:


> If I get the medicated chick starter for them everybody eats it and vice versa the chicks eat everything that the adults have. The checks have already had cracked corn, bread, yesterday they had watermelon, and I have no control over them.


Now you have me thinking...

When a farmer's cattle give birth, they are all in a field together but the farmers want the calves to get extra supplements without the adults getting it. They build a pen with the feeder in it (called a creep feeder) and make the door opening small enough that only the calves can get it.

Would that be an option with chicks as well?

Here's a link to one commercially built: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00834JYGG...e=df0&creative=395097&creativeASIN=B00834JYGG


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## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

There are chick feeders. I hate the things. The hens try to break in so the feed and feeders end up every where. I had chicks actually get stuck in the hole with their head coming out of one hole and their butt sticking up out of another.

I've just always fed all of my birds a 20% flock raiser/grower and never had to be concerned with what they were eating.

I always kept Corrid on hand just in case but never had to use it.


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## sswanee17 (May 17, 2015)

Zamora, I was told the same thing as what you said and that's what I'm feeding my flock also. Unless a person confines their chicks no way to keep food separate.


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