A wool hen - creating one today

just read through the whole thread, wow what an awesome creative bunch you all are! mrs K, good on you for getting the courage for this, it matters not that you borrowed the idea... you perfected it and made it work for you and that is awesome. I've really been struggling with this whole heat lamp thing, it really messes with their rhythms, is a fire hazard. and now that my daughter got a nasty burn, I have renewed motivation for venturing into a solution for this. I'm on the 5th week with my CX and layer chicks so I may not try and do this this go round but it seems that we end up brooding chicks at least once a year now with our kids, it's great fun. as for the question of the meat birds, I have pefected a few elements of that. the cobb 500 is by far the most chicken like of the CX, they are energetic and cleaner. this year I used partly composted wood chips for substrate and the moisture management has been worlds better. I say this because I think a wooley hen would be awesome for CX but there would be a few challenges. with super high protein feed they have a tendency to go hypertonic and have diarrhea, this could pose a challenge for anything cloth, so perhaps adjusting the protein down and taking more time to grow them out would be worth a try. In any case, you'd have to experiment on ways to manage the moisture, maybe make the bottom out of hardware cloth and move the huddle box to a dry spot each night, maybe keep the strips of cloth shorter so they don't get pooped on. also they are much hotter chicks, like little furnaces. my guess is that you'd need to keep an eye on them to assure they don't over heat. because they run so hot, they are probably especially well suited to a wooley hen and by not having the light on at night, they would probably sleep rather than over eat so much, which may reduce the need for restricting food.

dang, I may have to get more chicks sooner than later just to try this... chicken math!

Thanks for this thread! It is so amazing to see ideas reinventing the common knowledge and replacing it. I am using heating pads for the first time this season and am loving it, But, what a grest idea to get out from under needing electricity!
Last season there was a maintenance power outage one night, and I used a down comforter in the brooder to get them through the night. I still have that comforter and am brainstorming how to use it as a wool hen. Cut it down to a good size, double it up, make some removable pillow case like covers that I can wash, have them rigged kind of like the heating pad frames, maybe sew in some buttonhole perforations in the mid areas so that you can run either very big buttons, or string, which connects to a supporting framework made above the blanket...like the bucket, so that it can kind of fluff down over the chicks? Maybe a long wide lean-to kind of shape, low in back and higher in front, hanging down on the sides? Maybe a floor pad for part of the space?

I am expecting a batch of twenty, plus am hatching out some, so thinking in terms of larger older birds and more space than the heating pad will provide.

I did have a little problem with the yarn strings, twice I had a chick get tangled in them. Both times I got the chick out no problem, but...

I have been thinking of stuffing something full of yarn, and tacking it in places, like a goose down quilt. Something that would provide insulation. Or using felted wool, we have some old horse saddle pad/ blankets that I am going to take a look at.

Not have electricity at the coop, this worked well.

Mrs k

Thank you, thank you thank you!

I made a wool hen yesterday and turned off the heat lamp. I was very nervous last night but everyone seems happy and healthy this morning in spite of an overnight low of 7°C (45°F). Some of my chicks are only a couple of days old.

I bought an old woollen blanket from my local Salvation Army shop for $3. I cut it into strips about 2cm (¾") wide. I discovered using the wife's rotary cutter (it looks like a pizza cutter and my wife uses it for quilting) was much easier and quicker than using scissors. I attached the strips to a piece of wire mesh using a larkshead knot (like making a latch hook rug), placed it over the open topped nesting box and covered it with a double layer of blanket and a piece of board. My 7 week old bantam chicks kindly slept on top of this providing additional insulation.

No more heat lamps for me!

Mark
in Australia

Here are the pics.

You can see evidence of the bantams having slept here:


Double thickness of blanket:


Under the blanket:


Rotary cutter:

thanks for the pics. I'm so stuck on needing a heat source in my head that I keep forgetting about this option. I want to scale up either a wooley hen or a MHP to handle 37 cornish cross. the meat birds produce a lot of heat and really do better when they can sleep at night and I hate the idea of wasting all that electricity.

oh good, I am glad you had success too! How tall is your set up? I am coming more and more to the belief, that they do not need heat, they need insulation.

Mrs k

Mrs. K said:

oh good, I am glad you had success too! How tall is your set up? I am coming more and more to the belief, that they do not need heat, they need insulation.

Mrs k

Click to expand...

It's about 10" tall.

This surprises me that it worked that well. My hen was more dense, and quite a bit shorter. Might not need it like that.,, hmmm.

I have a closet maid shelf that I picked up. It's about 24" long, and 12" wide, with a 2" lip on the front side, and a 4" lip on the back side. I'm thinking that would be a great wool hen. I can tie the fabric strips to the wire grid, put 6" bolts with fender washers for legs, cover the shelf with cardboard, and put a nice thick layer of shavings to fill up the "shelf".