The Internet's Worst Chicken Advice 

Don’t try stacking eggs In your incubator without rotating, all the chicks will be deformed. I’ve left for three days and got someone to rotate the eggs for me and they told me they forgot and when the chicks hatched they were all badly deformed and I had to put them all down

I think chickens that are kept more confined can benefit from some of the "entertainment" tools. But I think chickens with more freedom don't get bored.

chickens actually do need some form of entertainment; it keeps them healthy, prevents behavioral issues, and keeps them happy! obviously they don’t need anything complex, but they do need daily enrichment :)

lol...appreciate the complements on my coop buddy...now....send me your address so I can get you some wireless earbuds bhahhahaha....kidding buddy! Take care!

the story about the city in Belgium who gifted chicken to their citizens is actually true. the name of the city is Mouscron, you can look it up. everybody who got a chicken was supervised (and controlled) by employees of the city and they had to sign a contract to not slaughter the chicken in the first two years. it was a huge success! greetings from Germany!

I don't think all chickens play, but some that are socialized more/tame, and kept long term do seem to have the ability to play. I think the hanging lettuce is more about making them work a bit more for their food which you might not notice a difference, but that's why there's whole studies on animal enrichment at zoos at least. They can go without, but adding toys doesnt hurt, and might help a little.

Regarding hanging the cabbage, one reason is so the cabbage gets eaten on all sides, and doesn't sit on the ground composting on the side touching the dirt. This (hanging) makes it last longer and keeps it healthy for the chickens/ducks/goose/peacock eating said cabbage. 😊

Hi Morgan, My name is Christopher and i'm from Beverlo Belgium, and the story about the free chickens in Belgium is true. The name of the city was Mouscron but they still do it in other cities these days. Thanks for the amazing content! i watch your videos every time a new one comes out! ❤

That’s how I trained my new pullets to roost darken your chicken shelter and do the tuck and twirl and lay them all side by side in the darker room they’re all laid out and they don’t move for hours. They go to sleep. It’s so sweet to see all your pullets all laid out in rows!

Regular nests don't cause poopy eggs. Not cleaning your nests and allowing chickens to perch on them causes poopy eggs. Even your roll-away boxes had issue with accumulation of poop. 😅

Chickens (and other birds) have an instinct to rotate their eggs in the nest. They're supposed to be rotated. And they don't stack them in a big pile. The lady with the pile of eggs sounds insane honestly.

Hey Morgan, thanks for showing my incubator from a cooler! These were neat hacks. I am REALLY interested to try the stacking method in the incubator (at the end of your video) -- I've never seen that before! Great video. :)

Gold shaw farms is the best to watch while eating

Adding chilli to your bird feed is a great choice. It isn't a dewormer, BUT birds can't taste the capsaicin, so they can't taste it in their feed, however, bird feed thieves like rodents and squirrels can! It's an excellent deterrent if you're losing feed to pests!

I would disagree that chickens do need at least some at least some enrichment it's not going to hurt you to put a toy in their Coop every once in awhile. Also surprised you had no clue that you can hypnotize a chicken fairly easily too

I could see some scientific study over how a hanging cabbage vs. a plopped cabbage would affect a coop of chickens. The hanging cabbage might be more difficult for dominant chickens to monopolize.

I think enrichment is more for the keeper than the flock tbh. I.e. "empty nesters" I love giving ours treats, but on the opposite end of the spectrum I also have an indoor chicken as a pet that wears a diaper and a helmet bc she's half blind and runs into shit.😂

I think the point is that chickens may not NEED toys but, I do think that with a small backyard flock they do like hanging veg 🐓 mine also do like their perch in the run so why not?

I think there is a difference between people that raises backyard chickens vs farming. And herbs for chickens have lots of benefits just like for us like oregano good antibiotics, cayenne peppers will keep the mice out of their feed, many herbs are very beneficial for us and animals. (the average person thinks of seasonings is salt 😂). And yes chickens are smarter than you think, you need to spend time with them to see that and most farmers don't have the time for that. I love your way of farming, you're doing it the right way but it's not all your viewers want the same approach towards keeping chickens. 😎😉😍

That was cool but there was a few, like the bucket bath one, where there was no explanation on what the "hack" was supposed to make easier.

They have found recently that chicken eggs fed commercial oyster shell have concerning heavy metals, like lead. I'd rather feed my chickens their own shells and they are free.

I always wonder why you don’t have like horizontal poles in your chicken coop so the chickens can roost up on them, just curious 🧐

Robo Coop. 😂 I don’t even like the automated chicken doors 😂 that’s scary for me. I always have to check around for predators before I let me hens out. If I had automated door the predators could get in. It’s cool but doesn’t work for me ❤ great info all around

Im surprised you are so stern on the "chickens don't need enrichment". Many people that rescue chickens would claim otherwise so i'm curious why you think they aren't able to be entertained?

I heard/read somewhere that if you feed chickens the shells of their own eggs, you have to do things to obscure their smell, like bake or cook them. If you don't, the chickens might put 1+1 together and start seeing their freshly laid eggs as something delicious to peck at, meaning fewer eggs for you. So I'd be very careful about that.

I wouldn't try the hatching method I think because in the wild I know some birds do turn their eggs. They push them out of the center and do move them around which I assume rotating emulates so maybe just keep doing what you are doing.

I enjoyed these chicken hacks, but you need to go a bit slower and put a bit more detail in each one. It felt rushed. Love ya Morgan!

While I enjoyed the video, you sped through the tiktoks and pintrest so fast I wasn't sure what was happening all the time. Like whatever the lady was dipping her birds in? I don't know what it was or why you were angry. ^^; It felt like the video could have been 15 minutes and explained a little more about each of the posts you were discussing.

I throw their feed on the ground and I use one of those rubber tubs for water. Easy, peasy. It works just fine.👍🏼 In the past, I used one of those fancy waterers but it was a pain in the butt to constantly take apart and clean out. The chickens seemed to like the tub better anyway. Sure, it gets gross after a while but I change it out 2x a day. It’s easier to dump it and fill it than it was to clean out the fancy, shmancy waterer. Chickens don’t need fancy coops and fancy feeders. Give them space to scratch, a quality feed, a place to lay their eggs and a reasonably clean area (chickens are nasty) and they will thrive.

Oregano and red pepper flakes are excellent at helping chicken’s immune systems. Many experts recommend it. Tyson and Perdue even feed oregano

ooo our first sit-down blue screen video, this was fun! thank you for fighting the good fight against fake chicken news

Regarding Belgian cities giving away chickens, I found a few different news articles by searching in Dutch. Skimmed summaries as follows. 2005: Diest, every family can receive 3 chickens. The start was very successful. 2010: Moeskroen gave 50 families 2 chickens. They need to allow inspections for animal welfare. 2015: Aalst gives 1-3 chickens to over 500 families. Over 1.400 chickens were given away over the span of four hours. 2022: Roeselare gives 310 chickens to 112 families. This initiative has been ongoing for 20 years already: 11.326 chickens had been given away during this span of time. So, since this seems to be happening in multiple municipalities years apart, and in some cases for many years in a row, I get a surface-level impression that it is successful for the commonly stated purpose of reducing or doing away with greens trash pickup in those places.

I can't smell my chickens either, I lost my sense of smell years ago.

Gold Shaw Farms doesn't believe in America?

It would be interesting to see who worries about entertaining their chickens and who doesn't - and I've got $50000 that says girls do and boys don't.... My chickens love their playground AND their summer house AND their sun house AND the pile o' pallets.

Don't ever tell the lady at the feed store who names all her hens that chickens are dumb Morgan 😂

White House on the hill did the trick with Dunking the chickens in mite protection

Paper should be for recycling to make other paper - not chicken mulch, not cat litter, not hamster mulch. Food doesn't create warmth, calories do. I am planning on getting chickens this late summer so the good points are fun. Pre-seasoning - tongue-in chick (pun intended - LOL) - but I heard the red peppers do away with worms and parasites. I do need to get a big fishing net. I think I will need a net/roof because we have Coopers Hawks and buzzards in our area, not to mention a few Eagles. I am going to use Diamotaceous Earth and sand in a tub just for the biddies. (You keep mentioning 'links you will leave below' but they are NOT in the 'description of the video??? Or - are the @ signs the links???? Confused.) We are going to build the Chicken Coop that looks like a tiny KFC drive through with the 'Chicken Nuggets" label on the egg side. HA!

Ugh... I hate the whole "simple tricks" and "hacks" thing. They're usually just dumb ideas framed in a way to make it look like they're solving a problem so you don't have to buy anything that actually solves the problem. Example - There's one that says you can wrap your toilet in plastic wrap to create a vacuum to plunge a stuck toilet as an alternative to just using a plunger. They want you to use and discard expensive plastic wrap multiple times, (which may not even work well) instead of buying the plunger once and having a tool that gets the job done every time for decades. ARRRRGH!!!

What was going on with the chicken-in-a-bucket there?? I mean, I cut down a kiddie pool in the summer, put 2-3 inches of water in it, and shove it between some bushes so it's shaded all day, and my girls will stand in it for about 5 minutes or so when they get hot. I mean, good grief, we're in Texas, and 117° F is no joke, and the girls love it. I've got one of them that has HER SPOT in the pool, and she will peck the daylights out of the sassy fluffer that tries to get in on that particular spot. And yeah, with backyard chickens that are simply pets that poop breakfast, they do like simple toys that they can peck, chase, and play rugby over. Heck, my guard goose has a ball that he'll chase down and beat seven kinds of heck out of, turn around and screech so I'll praise him. What a big fierce goose you are! Meanwhile, one of the girls is on a mission to keep all the squirrels out of HER yard. You've never lived until you watch a Buff Orpington chase a squirrel across the yard, then keep hopping and flapping for all she's worth after it's gone up the tree. I think she's jealous because the goose snuck up on one squirrel and chomped it on the tail... Boy, I almost fell over laughing so hard.

...okay so the thing about commercial farming...there's a reason for EVERYTHING. It's all about production and there are studies about it. "It's what they've been taught"... No they wouldn't waste the labor rotating them if they didn't have to. Taking calves from dairy moms- most are bad moms and it decreases disease risk. (Does that make it the best option? Not in my opinion. I think it would be better to breed to mothering instincts). Keeping animals indoors - protects then against the elements, makes them easy to access for daily chores and treatment if they need it. Adding fertilizer - the studies said it was better at the time. There's always a reason. Farmers are always weighing the pros and cons with the information they have. They aren't just doing things "because that's what they were told to do"

You can harm your chickens by clipping their wings if you DON,T know what you're doing. I recommend if possible having somebody show you how. Or just go slow until you get the hang of it. If you clip too close to the wing you will get blood, if it's just one or two you can release the chicken and everything should be fine. Honestly if you cut into a lot of blood feathers it will probably be fine, but at that point it's a lot of stress to the bird and as it is 100-percent preventable I consider it unnecessary cruelty.

Hi.... Morgan nice to see you love watching your videos homestead Beautiful good job keep it up 👋 bye 👋 bye 👋 bye 👋 👕🐔🐓🐣🐥🐩🐩🐈🐄🐝🌱🏡🎥👍👍👍

I believe in animal enrichment 100%, most animals require it. 🤷🏻‍♀️ Just because chickens are kind of simple doesn't mean they wouldn't enjoy it.

I am glad you tear apart hacks bec there is so much information out there yiy don't know until you've tried it yourself and failed or succeeded, I'd rather watch THE videos, ****yours**** and do it right from the beginning. You just put everything out there including the mistakes you've made and then tried again and again until you've perfected something.

I believe every animal deserve at least one enrichment item. And even if you don't HAVE to give it to them, I still would because it makes ME happy, and probably them too. Why not give them enrichment, it doesn't harm anyone (choosing the correct items is the responsibility of the keeper). Also I don't think intelligence is the only factor that determines how much an animal may wish to play! Enrichment is a great way to let animal express and manage their natural behaviors along with providing entertainment for the keepers. Since the chickens on Morgan's farm are loose much of the time the probably get plenty of stimulation foraging and exploring but not every chicken owner has a farm.

If you want to have chickens (or any farm animal), wouldn't you want to actually interact with the animals? At least on some level? Why would anyone want a fully automated... chicken coop? I guess I don't see the appeal of that. Sure being able to take a day off here or there would be nice, but the whole point of having animals is to interact with them and take care of them. Or that's what I always thought.

While I probably should not be surprised as the internet is an endless expanse of the good, bad and wacky, I did not expect there to be enough chicken hacks to become a video, never mind a series. Sure do more, with commentary of course. I disagree with not providing "entertainment" for chickens. Admittedly you do not need to purchase a motorized toy, but new foods or otherwise safe new edibles can't hurt right?

You should commission an artist to draw some of your chickens wearing Rolex watches around their necks and VR headsets on their heads while driving recklessly on ATVs with the caption, "Chickens don't need toys" Have T-shirts and stickers made.

There is research showing that enrichment improves the welfare of animals. Now free range chickens probably get plenty of enrichment exploring, but not all chickens get to fully free range. For those chickens "toys" may be truly beneficial. Also special treats or variety in diet can be enrichment so a cabbage to peck at is likely enrichment whether it's thrown on the ground or hung from a hook (does this keep things cleaner?). Let me know if you want me to find specific research papers on enrichment.

Chicken coops off the ground with a ramp going to the outside to a fenced in pen is how my father kept our chckens.

What happen to you farming? RU-vid has you chasing some views the easy way. Using other peoples videos and talking over is the worst form of entertainment.. I know I’m not alone here.

A lot of animals will benefit from enrichment and toys, even if they don't necessarily "need" them. So I will respectfully, but strongly disagree with you on this stance.

You do fully sound like the Grinch "ah stupid chicken toys!" >:( It doesn't hurt to have enrichment, like what are you mad at?

you would go through all the effort to transform a cooler into an incubator but not dry already available eggs shells as a calcium supplement?? lol. ok. oh and ps...I love Murica.

I love your channel but I do believe you shouldn’t be throwing stones unless you wanna have stones thrown back , you obviously need much more education and a few more years before pick on other you tubers . Just saying ! Lol

I love your channel. You videos have taught me a lot. But as someone who has grown up with parrots, I disagree when you say birds don't need toys. All animals need something to kill time with. ... But admittedly I have never had chickens. So what do I know. 😂

I would guess that the reason hatcheries turn eggs is because the birds turn the eggs in their nests. I suppose that could be a neutral behavior that doesn't actually make a difference, but given how long ppl have been hatching eggs in incubators, I'm sure plenty of ppl have tried hatching eggs without turning them and there's a reason they continue to turn the eggs. My guess is more chicks survive the hatching process if the eggs are turned than when the eggs are not turned.

What are they doing at 10:17-10:30 that made Morgan so mad? I don’t understand what they are trying to accomplish by dunking their chickens in chemicals.

I don’t know why you would have to use a nett I’ve had chickens over 7 years now and I’ve never had to use a nett to catch them

My goto i SWEAR works and learned from my grandpa is putting apple cider vinegar in my chickens water once a week. I never have any sick birds.

10:25 what are they doing and why does it make you mad? Is it for when the legs get scaley/flakey? What's do you recommend instead?

10:18 I don't understand what's going on here? New to chicken keeping so I'd love to know what *not* to do that made Morgan so mad 😅

I think it would be super interesting if you set up an experiment with a bunch of different incubation methods to test out which ones work best for you. Could be an interesting series ongoing. 🥚 🐣 🐥 🐓

Half of me watched for the commentary 😆 and the other half out of fear I was gonna be on it 😅

I have two chicken coops off the ground that is the best way to go with doors my chickens likes their chicken coops

hypnotising chickens is kind of dodgy triggering a stress reaction mind you turkeys you can get to stretch out necks on a chopping block which is easy

loved the chicken head under the wing rocking..OF course I"m gonna try it tomorrow..LOL

My neighbor just got chickens and I have seen them chilling in my yard and heard the rooster crowing every day...and love it. At first I was a little worried about the chickens and the huge pack of wild turkeys getting along, but they seem to coexist nicely.

The excitement of you putting your chickens to sleep was adorable 😂😂😂

when does hatching season start? the videos that you make that are my favorites are the ones with the hatching.

Some chickens will pick on each other if they get bored. They do need enrichment of some kind

Morgan, love your videos and you are an inspiration! But PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE recant your support of that chicken "trick." It may look funny to us, but it's cruel. What's happening is you're putting your chicken into tonic immobility (it's like a short-term paralysis). Tonic immobility results when a chicken experiences containment (like capture) and extreme fear. It's like "playing dead" - I'm sure you've seen a mouse look dead when your cat sets him down, but after a few seconds, he gets up and runs. That's tonic immobility. This is an involuntary reaction that evolved to help them escape predators. There has been a TON of scientific research on this that shows that chickens are in EXTREME fear when in tonic immobility. We are torturing our chickens when we put them in this state. If you are skeptical of this, I can put a summary together for you with cited studies. But please tell your viewers NOT to do this! Best, Bri

Why were they dunking their chickens in the bucket....to prevent what?

Definitely true that most if not all animals need some sort of enrichment Animals get bored

“ they will hop fences that are 3 or 4 feet high” mine have hopped a six foot fence and not even touched the top just up and over 😂😂

My grandfather taught me how to put a chicken to sleep by rocking it way back in the late 1970's. This is the first time I've ever seen anyone else do it, though I have shown many over the decades.

Amazing what some people come up with, lol. The swinging of a chicken back and forth had me going, and I see you used Black Francis as a test pilot, too funny. All in all, the bottom line I guess is to do your homework, and you Morgan have been doing a good deal of that. Thanks for taking us along, see you soon.

You never ever wash eggs with hot water. Luke warm at the most.

The question I have is can you stack sleeping chickens?

I'm not really sure about using diatomaceous earth in any situation where it can be breathed in easily, cause it's basically silica particles (crushed up diatoms), and silicosis is an incredibly unpleasant disease to end up with. It is great for stopping bugs though as they can't cross it, and if they try they will die shortly after. It has the caveat that it needs to stay dry to work, so not particularly great around waterfowl.

Please please please please pleaseeeee don’t do stack hatching, when the chicks are ready to hatch, the ones on top will be able to hatch just fine, but the ones on the bottom will not be able to hatch at the right time, which could kill them

I bought a chicken swing the other day

Would love to see you do one on the geese and ducks.

I knew a lady from Belgium who had chickens and she told me that in Belgium they give a chicken to anyone buying a house to use as a garbage disposal..

Lesson, don’t take lessons from TikTok.

Looking good Morgan. Keep up the great work. It's a struggle, I know! Good health leads to a great life.

Reason I use egg shells instead of oyster shells, I’m allergic to oyster shells.

omg what were those chicken names 😅

My biggest predator isn't 4-legged. And I have lost very few to hawks or owls, but the crows are more brave when it comes to chicks. My biggest predator is rat snakes. I kept my new bantam chicks inside until they were 2 months old, and within the first week of putting them in my grow-out run (1" grid hardware cloth), a 4' snake had gotten one. Planning on a new grow-out pen with 1/2" hardware cloth. I've even had a snake kill a full-grown broody hen when I kept taking her eggs to get her to break brood (after he got 5 eggs). My chickens are total free-range, and the Cuckoo Maran roo is huge, so these bantams will not go free-range. Building a new coop just for them. If one of these remaining 4 bantams is a roo, I may just put J.R. in a pot and let the bantams loose. I already have 5 new hens out of J.R. I could let the crippled guinea out, too. J.R. beats up on Larry.

That head-under-the wing trick -- HYSTERICAL! Can't believe it really puts chickens to sleep. But I don't think it will work on ducks or geese. I don't see the link for the duck egg washer, can you pls. post it?

their cousins(don't forget chicken are what happened to the dinasours), the reptiles, their eggs don't get moved at all for fear of drowning the developing fetus's,...after the initial 24hrsexterme care is taken to make sure the eggs keep in the same orientation, Granted, these eggs in nature would frequently also be buried or well hidden depending on the animal and are soft or leathery to reduce reduce rolling; Snake eggs will actually and to each other where they touch and harden together into a pile so they don't roll away whether mom stay's with the clutch or not.... some very tiny lizards also have sticky eggs that they leave on leaves...but there is some talk that the reptile eggs are safe to roll..... Also, in the 'you don't need to roll your eggs' side haven't you seen the videos of the kids in Japanese's Highs School growing CHIC IN A CLAER CUP!!!! WITHOUT A AN EGGSHELL! it's awesome, they do it in science class of course. just look up "chick hatched without eggshell "there are several videos to choose from ,you could even try it... say hi to the kitties for me

Rocking a chicken with head under it wing is NOTHING new....The point here people will do this with chucker partridge, Pheasants, pigeons Quail to place in a field ..for Dog training to simulate a field Hunt...

Snow will work like grass for cleaning:)

The second tip. Newspaper ok. That stuff is food safe. Plasticized paper? No thank you. Number 3? Chickens are native to India and there they eat spicy peppers straight off the plant. It won't warm them up, but they loooooove peppers.

Thanks for the video. Here in Australia due to completely shutting down caged egg farms, prices of eggs are going to go through the roof, allegedly to around $16 per dozen. Now I’m contemplating making a little chicken coop.

Don't hatch eggs without turning. I tried it only ended up with two chicks out of like 40 eggs. One of them is blind in one eye.

Push your chickens head on the ground, hold it there. Draw a short line in front of the chicken with your finger directly out from its beak 3x. Not across, straight out. 3x. Remove your hand from holding chicken. It'll stay with its head down on ground, seemingly stuck there until you move her. Hypnotized. Try it.

Ok so I predict… …. Fast forward 20 years and you will be a grumpy farmer protesting that chickens don’t need their own Ivy League schools or a chicken olympics or any newfangled toys whatsoever 🤣

My chicken set up has kept steady laying all Canadian winter. Slowed but constant. They live inside a barn, it's not very air tight so I provide a single heat lamp during our storms or Windy nights below 20c The girls almost never roost under the light so it's likely not beneficial for heat but the extra light does help since we lose hours of daylight midwinter. For enrichment they get free range access around the farm and constant human attention usually. Bugs+human food as treats sometimes. Water is a pain in the ass, I should get a heater. But it keeps me active knowing I need to change it out daily. They will chose to roost in my wood shop if I leave the door open and the wood stove burning, but that's a special treat because I need to clean that up. They enjoy sitting with me until the early morning hours while I watch RU-vid and have a smoke or two. Yes, I have high airflow in the shop don't worry.