Feeding 
One of the Most Important Problems the 
Back-Yard Poultry man Has to Deal With 
Comfort the 
First Feed 
The Feeding 
Board 
We shall begin here by assuming that you have never seen a baby chick 
and wouldn’t know a “layer” if you were to meet one on the street. In 
other words, we shall start you at the foot of the ladder and lead you rung 
by rung to the top. 
Regardless of whether you break in with hatching eggs or baby chicks, 
your first feeding problem will be to take the little chicks along the right 
road. 
The first thing to feed your chicks is comfort. 
In order to provide this, and to make sure that everything is in good 
working order, it will be advisable to heat your hover for two days before 
putting the chicks under it. The floor of the hovering place must be 
covered with 1 inch of clean sand, on top of which there must be at least 
1 inch of litter. Cut straw makes the best litter, though cut hay or mow 
scrapings will serve. If clean sand is not available, ashes, dry earth, or 
an extra inch of litter may be used. 
The temperature under the hover should be maintained at 92 degrees 
during the first week. 
Your chicks should be placed under the hover 24 hours after the hatch 
has been completed—or immediately upon their arrival if you bought them 
already hatched. Chicks must be left in the incubator at least 24 hours 
after the hatch in order to dry out. 
Provided you hatch your own chicks, the best time to transfer them 
to the hover will be about 3 o’clock in the afternoon. 
Running entirely around the hover, and about 4 inches away from the 
curtain at the beginning, there should be a circle of building paper or some 
similar material from 8 to 10 inches high. Enough of the paper should 
be lapped to permit of enlargement of the circle every day or so till the 
chicks have learned to run to the hover for warmth, after which the paper 
wall can be taken away. 
A strip of building paper 12 feet long will give ample material. 
A board about 2 feet long and 8 inches wide should be placed in the 
yard or run to hold the first feed of grit and be used thereafter as a feeding 
board. Lengths of ordinary building laths should be tacked to the four 
sides of the board so as to form a rim around it and keep the grain from 
rolling off. 
The feeding board, containing a little grit, but no food, should be in 
the hovering pen when the chicks are put there. 
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