Size of brooder

[chickmomnicole]

We have a 40gallon tub we bought from the feed place we bought our chicks. We started with 6 chicks Saturday and lost one on Sunday. We got three more today and now have a total of 8 chicks. They are all under 2 weeks old. What size is recommended for this amount of chicks at this age. I feel like since we added the three new ones it has been kind of crazy and the chick are stepping over each other and on each other even though there is plenty of room. Is this normal? Sorry first time raising chicks!

 

[Ol Grey Mare]

You want 1-2 square feet of brooder space (excluding space occupied by feed/water stations) per chick - a 40 gallon tub is unlikely to have a footprint that offers that amount of space for 8 chicks. Not only does this allow enough space per bird, but smaller brooders are such that you don't have the ability to properly maintain the temperature by having one warm zone under the lamp and a lot of cooler space in the rest of the brooder - with a small brooder and a lamp you end up with nearly the entire space being heated.