Do not allow the mother hen to range over the farm with the chicks.
Confine the mother hen to a brood coop until the chicks are weaned.
Toe-mark the chicks as soon as they are hatched. This enables one to tell their ages later.
In cool weather place from 10 to 13 eggs under the hen; in warm weather from 13 to 15 eggs.
Chicks should not receive feed until they are 36 hours old.
When artificial incubation is used, start the brooder a day or two before putting in the chicks, to see that the heating apparatus is working properly. Brooder lamps should be cleaned every day.
In the case of hen-hatched broods, the coop for hen and chicks should be well ventilated, easy to clean, and large enough to insure comfort. To allow the hen to range over the farm with the chicks will often be the cause of heavy losses.
For the first three days chicks may be fed a mixture of equal parts of hard-boiled eggs and rolled oats or stale bread, or stale bread soaked in milk. When bread and milk are used, care should be taken to squeeze all the milk out of the bread. From the third or fourth day commercial chick feed may be fed until the chicks are old enough to eat wheat screenings or cracked corn.