Preparing for your meat birds

It's a very exciting week here at Smokey Creek Farm as we are getting ready for our first batch of meat birds to arrive on Friday! We have a small order of 50 Cornish Cross chicks coming in and I cannot wait for those sweet little fuzzy nuggets to be here. There is something about those little peeps that just get me so excited knowing that Spring is just around the corner.

So where do our chicks come from? We have several different hatcheries that we use and it really all depends on the breed and availability at the time. There are a lot of different breeds of meat birds and they all have been bred to grow very quickly in order to cut down the cost of processing them start to finish. We have done Red Rangers before and really enjoyed them, but this time we are doing Cornish Cross which are undoubtedly the most popular breed. Because these chickens are bred for meat, they are not meant to sustain life past about 10ish weeks so we process at around 8 weeks.

How do they get here? This is my most favorite part of the whole chick experience. These chicks are packaged and sent through the mail on the day that they hatch. It is imperative that you get them warm and settled ASAP to make sure they don't suffer from environmental stress. The post office will call me immediately, even if they aren't open yet, to let me know that the chicks are here and then I go and pick them up as soon as I possibly can. My dad always tells me about when he was a young boy how he would go to the post office with his dad in the Spring time, all you could hear were all the peeps of the baby chicks waiting to be picked up. Picking them up is just a very nostalgic feeling and I love it so much.

What next? So the most important thing is to have your nice warm brooder set up and ready for the chicks arrival. We have a large coop that we have prepped and secured for them with heat sources, fresh bedding, and their food and water. We give our meat birds broiler feed because it's super high in protein and there's really no need to change to a different feed as they grow. I also prepare them "magic water" that helps give them an immunity boost and gives them a really positive start to their life. I have the recipe on our Facebook page if you want some yourself! We always dip each chicks beak in the water just to show them where it is and to get them acclimated to their new surroundings.

I know that they are meat birds and they will only be with us for a few short weeks, but I always enjoy preparing for their arrival. Those sweet little puff balls will grow into some of the most wonderful and nourishing food for our family and there is something really special about taking extra good care of them and nurturing them yourself. Once you know the basics of chicken health, it's really simple and you could absolutely do this yourself!