Day-Old Chicks (DOC): What They Reveal About Your Chicken Business

Day-old chicks, usually shortened to DOC, are chicks that are just one day old. The success of a chicken farming business is largely decided while the birds are still at the DOC stage. Good day-old chicks move quickly and nimbly and actively look for food. A healthy chick usually weighs about 36 grams, with round, bright eyes. Other signs of a good chick include a soft, elastic abdomen and a navel covered with fine, glossy, cotton-like down. Every poultry farmer should know how to check chicks for the traits above, because they can affect how the birds grow from then on.

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Telling the Sex of Day-Old Chicks

The sex of a chick less than a month old is hard to tell. Poultry farmers use several methods to sex their chicks. Some farms look at the comb, feathers or legs. Others check the chick's cloaca. With the cloaca method, farmers can confirm the sex of a chick one day after it hatches. The cloaca is the rear opening on the chick's body that serves as the single outlet for the digestive, urinary and reproductive tracts, as it does in certain other species such as birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish. This method is more accurate for confirming a chick's sex, but it takes skill and experience to do it well.

Two Types of Day-Old Chicks

Day-old chicks from commercial laying breeds can be divided into two types.

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Light-Type DOC

Light-type chicks are bred specifically to become laying hens. All of their resources are directed toward egg production alone. Light-type chicks have a large single comb that flops to one side, bright eyes and a small, slim body, and they move actively and nimbly. These birds can start laying at 4 months of age. Light-type chickens produce a large number of eggs with fairly thin white shells.

Medium-Type DOC

Chicks of this type are bred for 2 jobs: laying eggs and producing meat. Because of these two uses, they are also called dual-purpose chickens. Even so, medium-type birds put more of their resources into egg production than into meat. Medium-type chicks have a large body with thicker leg and breast muscles. They usually carry a lot of meat on the legs and breast because the muscles there are large. Unlike the quick, nimble light-type chicks, medium-type chicks move calmly. These birds lay many eggs per year, with thick brown shells.

Many farmers choose medium-type chicks because they serve two purposes, producing eggs and meat. Besides laying plenty of eggs, medium-type birds also produce good-quality meat, which is why farmers usually pick the birds that will bring the most profit to the future of their chicken farming business.

Also read Essential Preparations Before Raising Layer Chicks (DOC)