Minnesota Farm Vacation: Baby chicks

One of the most fun days I had on my Minnesota vacation at Misty Meadows Farm was going to the local post office in Rochester to pick up 500 baby chicks.  We picked them up very early, about 6:00 AM, the cooler part of the morning.

 

I've  never heard such a commotion.  They call these fat, fluffy furballs "peepers" by the way.

 

Paul Wiens had already prepared the pen for the chicks in the barn.  He laid down a thick pile of sawdust wood shavings in the pen.  In the center of the pen were heat lamps so the chicks were nice and toasty.  Near the lamps were five upside down containers that held a sugar water concoction and on the other side of the lamps were long containers for feed.

We counted the chicks as we placed them in the pen.  There were about 100 chicks per box.  The chicks went straight to the food and water!

It was really funny how the chicks followed each other around the pen.  Even though the chicks were small and hardly weighed anything, they made a funny pattering noise as they chased each other around the pen.

I checked on those chicks a lot--sometimes because the chicks were so small and soft, they were able to slide out of a tiny hole in the pen.  It was so funny to see one or two chicks standing outside the pen, they didn't seem to know what to do!

 

Next post:  My walk on a misty Minnesota morning and what I spied!