5th Annual BYC New Year's Day 2014 Hatch-A-Long

[JLaw]

We use a giant old ice chest (missing its lid) with a homemade lid. Your PVC/zip tie hinge is an awesome idea! We have to remove the entire lid - great job!

My other lid for the other metal 2x4 trough has two hinged lids middle 1.5ft section is squared with two little lids like the one shown.

 

[ronott1]

These are ~~abmaddox1981 eggs posting entry pics looks like 35 eggs to me.

Got it!

 

[BadgerHill]

Is anyone trying a hatch in a house with a wood burning stove? I tried some eggs in Oct with a nov 1st hatch day and found it very difficult to keep my humidity up. The eggs were pretty light, at least 15% weight lost, and only 4 of 10 hatched. Just wanting any thoughts. I am hoping to try again in February...

 

[chickengirl1193]

chickengirl1193, brooders can be as simple as you want - even a cardboard box, although my preference is larger plastic storage containers (washable and easy to disinfect). I line the bottom with newspaper, then a layer of shavings, then cover with paper towels (the papr towel is removed after the first few days). Before I put in shavings I put in a couple pieces of 2x4 or a half patio block for the waterer to sit on so it is less likely to tip over. Heat lamp suspended/clamped over one end. Put a thermometer under it and turn it on. Should not take more than an hour to come to temp, more like 15 minutes - should be ~95 degrees right under it. Warmer - move the lamp higher, cooler, move it lower. As long as the heat is at one end the chicks can get away from it as they need to. I put food and water about midway between warm and cool ends. Sprinkle some starter crumble on the paper towels so the chicks spot it and pick it up.



I would start looking for starter now, I always buy a 50 lb bag because I have given in to the reality that I will hatch year round. I prefer a locally ground starter, and they only grind once a year, so once they're out I have to use one of the commercial brands (Purina, Nutrena, etc.).



I pull the paper towel up once I know they are eating from the feeder. It's handy to have two brooders so you can just move the chicks from the dirty one to the clean one when necessary. When you are ready to clean, you roll the whole mess (minus chicks and whatever the waterer is sitting on) up inside the newspaper like a burrito and put in the trash bag.

thank you for the suggestions!!!! im thinking ill use an old large rabbit cage since its something we have in the garage. and on the food, should i get medicated starter or un medicated? and do i need to get a starter, and then a starter grower? or just a starter grower?

Those that are having problems posting pics you can E-mail them to me with your username at [email protected] I will post them for you I will check this a few times aday or you can send me a pm to have me check sooner. That's if its easier to mail than post here.

As for chicken brooders I've used a few things and finaly got a set up I like. They go from bator to a cat crate that I cut the lid off of and then built a lid for it. 2-3 days later or if I get too many in there the oldest goes into next step. Which is one of 4 things. I have 2 metal water troughs 2ftx4ft with lids I need to make alittle better or the 2ftx4ft wooden brooder I built. Also I've use a dog kennel where I screw a board to top of it then hang light facing the inside of front door. The cat crate gets 85watt bulb normaly good enough for temp with out cooking them. The others I use a 250 watt to start out with and then I lower the wattage down to 150watts then 95 watts to lower my temp. Only the wooded brooder has a set up where I can raise and lower the light bulbs.

cat crate light sits on lid.cardboard on lower part of door to help keep cold air out.



ATM zip tied but hindges need to secure to bins still. Made this after my last hatch have only used it as a sick bay for my prolapsed vent hen and a broken toe chick so far.


This is the wooden one that is suppose to be out in my mud room but I've yet to take it out there. 2 front doors each held in by a sliding bolt lock going into the wood. don't mind my mess here lol

these are great ideas! thank you! i have a cat carriers laying around but since we have 4 cats i dont think i can cut the tops off... i do have a wire dog crate tho that i can use since i dont lock my puppy up anymore

Some good advice.
We all have our methods and it's hard to screw up unless we cook them.
I rarely use a small container for brooding, though I do have a couple huge Rubbermaid tubs if I'm only brooding 1-5 chicks. As long as the room isn't super cold a heat lamp isn't necessary in such a small space. The first time I used a tub I'm so glad I put a thermometer under the heat lamp before I put the chicks in. It exploded. I had a friend house/chicken/dog sitting for a couple days. He cooked the chicks by having the lamp too close. From that point on I just use a 75 watt bulb in a drop light and that's sufficient. You can cover part of the tub with a piece of cardboard or board to hold some heat in.

If you are using a small container, they do sell ceramic infrared heat emitters in various wattages from 75-250. I use them almost exclusively now for brooding. They aren't as prone to breaking and if they do they don't leave bits of glass all over.
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trk...&_nkw=ceramic+heat+emitter&_sacat=0&_from=R40

I also do the burrito thing but I only use paper towels. Even if I use a tub, they aren't in there any more than a week or so. I get a cheap roll when I start chicks and put down a double layer. Every day I roll it up and put it in the compost pile.

Another good point you made was to keep them on paper towels until they know what food is. A broody will show the chicks what to eat.
Without a mom, chicks will eat whatever is at their feet. If that's shavings they may choose to eat some. I put burlap over the shavings and paper towels over that. Sprinkle the feed and hardboiled egg yolk on the paper towels when I stick them in the brooder space the first day, then they find the feed in the feeders.

I would look for a good starter now too, it will get you away from the incubator. I wouldn't buy it yet though. Whole grains hold their nutrients well but once ground, as in chicken feed, it loses it's nutrients and palatability a lot faster.
The TSC about a half hour from me heavily discounts their feed when it's about 3 months old. I imagine it is a corporate policy.
The feed store right up the street doesn't have a ton of chicken customers and most are buying layer. The last time I checked, their start and grow was 4 months old. I wouldn't buy it. They had packages of vitamins/electrolytes that had expired 3 years earlier. I told them about it. The packs are still there today.
Always read labels, not only for feed ingredients, protein and calcium percentages, sources of protein, but also for the packaging date or expiration date.
Most of my feed comes from a friend that wholesales and I've never gotten a bag from her that was over a month since bagged.
In the commercial poultry business; layers, broilers, turkeys etc., the feed they get is only a day old. I used to program mills for some of the largest poultry producers. It was really high pressure because they (like the auto industry) did the 'just in time' supply system. However it's more important with poultry because the feed has a shelf life. An axle lasts a long time on the shelf. In the auto industry they just wanted to eliminate the inventory cost.
We always had an expression when a line in the mill went down. "We're starving chickens".
The mills are only idle a few hours on Sunday night. They are a steady line of feed trucks almost 24 hours a day making deliveries to the farms.

My preference for brooding is a large space with one or two(depending on season) hot spots and lots of cool space. It is so much easier than stressing over the temperature of the brooder. This is the way a broody raises the chicks and is much healthier. She provides a warm place and lots of cool space. She doesn't warm all the ambient air.

thank you for such great ideas!! is it necessary to have a red light? or will a yellow light or white work just as good...
i have a local feed store that is like that also, whenever i buy dog food i have to check the dates because i went home with an expired bag once and im a bit worried that its going to be like that with the chick food. I have a feeling though that they may not stock it this time of year and they can order me a bag which may be safer than TSC which i dont think keeps up on discounting expired things

 

[Nonyah Biz]

Is anyone trying a hatch in a house with a wood burning stove? I tried some eggs in Oct with a nov 1st hatch day and found it very difficult to keep my humidity up. The eggs were pretty light, at least 15% weight lost, and only 4 of 10 hatched. Just wanting any thoughts. I am hoping to try again in February...

i am and i have pots of water on my wood stove

 

[Ramblin Rooster]

I

It is hard to find one that is reliable. If you keep the center water well full your humidity should be fine. 
I think they are around $44 dollars if you buy it direct from Brinsea. A friend lent me hers and I like it so much I am going to buy my own     

I will probably buy myself one. Theres one that apparently can be hooked up to a camera! That would be cool!

 

[ChickenCanoe]

In my experience locally. TSC is very good about moving their food before it is beyond the pale.

I keep light on them 24/7 for the first week so a white light is ok then. After that they need a dark period so I'd switch to a red light or a ceramic emitter.
The first week they'll sleep whenever they get tired and when they're awake I like them to have food.
A red light limits pecking. Chickens in constant bright lighting tend to go a little crazy.
And like any earth bound creature, they need a dark period.

I'm begging for a textbook for Christmas called 'Poultry Lighting' that has the up to date research on chicken's photo receptors, physiology, intensity, ahemeral lighting and color spectrums, source, pathological and behavioral consequences of extremes of illumination . It's about fifty bucks.
After I read it I'll be able to share.

 

[BadgerHill]

i am and i have pots of water on my wood stove 

I finally got water on mine too and hope that will help. I will be interested in how your hatch goes. Are you hatching local or shipped eggs?

 

[abmaddox1981]

Thanks JLaw for making sure my eggs got counted! And you're right, it is 35 eggs I forgot to tell you that in my email. *facepalm*

 

[Nonyah Biz]

I finally got water on mine too and hope that will help. I will be interested in how your hatch goes. Are you hatching local or shipped eggs?

im also going to put a humidifer closer(not too close) to incubator (wood stove is in other room) my first time hatching and they are from myEE hens and banty cochin roo(hummm that should be intresting lol).i want the learning exp. through trial an error before i buy eggs