Heating pad brooder question

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Oh goodness. I suppose all this teaching comes from the fact that we've bred most of the broodiness out of chickens, so along with it, the instinct to care for and teach their young?

(By the way, thanks azygous, like another poster said somewhere, it's like talking to a legend. I keep coming across Blooie's and your posts about MHP and that was my inspiration to do it right from the get go, instead of getting ready to lay hens).

I also tested my brooder because I was so nervous. I set it up before my flock came home and made a few adjustments because it was a bit cold. I still test it occasionally and now, inside my (somewhat) air conditioned home, the cave is reaching anywhere from 85-90. All day they run all around and jump on it and snuggle up inside it, so it was baffling when they wouldn't SLEEP in it...

Chicks are now a week old!! I can't believe how HUGE they are compared to day 1 already!!
 
I think I read somewhere that the air temperature isn't what you should test, but for some reason, I can't get my pad low enough to touch the chickens, so that's exactly what I'm doing. I'm just sticking a regular thermometer inside it to get the air temp inside.

They seem to have *maybe* figured it out tonight!
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I used an old fashioned mercury thermometer to test the heating pad setup. I turned the pad on the highest setting and laid the thermometer on the floor under the pad. The thermometer wasn't touching the heating pad.

When I've made contact with the thermometer to the pad, it reads 100F or slightly higher. This is pretty nearly the ideal temperature for day-old chicks to be in contact with.

Most people have been getting readings of 80-85F just laying the thermometer inside the cave.
 
@Rural Broody @azygous Same thing here. Our summer climate is super warm and I finally just took the broody cave out after about 2 weeks to give them more space. Almost a month in and they are still piling in a corner to sleep (even though they have roosts and use them all the time in the day). Otherwise they all seem to be happy, healthy and full of beans!
 
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That's awesome TabbyKat! I can't wait for hubby to finish my coop so I can get mine outside too!

For now, mine seem to have "re-learned" the heating pad, and most of them are all snuggled up inside. 3 or 4 are half in/half out, and one is sleeping all by herself about an inch away from the others in a nest she dug in the pine chips haha.

They're getting so big! And on that note, I gotta say, SHARP. My kids scared them and they all ran at me and a few jumped on my leg to scramble to safety. This resulted in me getting 2 stinging cuts on my leg. Yowzers! They're also scratching at the pine more aggressively. I have to keep clearing the chips out of their food.
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Mine all have a fascination with a tiny mole on the back of my right hand- not so cute anymore LOL I now wear a glove -Michael Jackson style- around them. They also love sparkly nail polish.
 

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