Brinsea Ecoglow chick brooder - one BIG flaw!

[Highlander]

Gypsy, can i ask if you are still happy with the ecoglow now that the chicks are a bit bigger? How many is reasonable amount to fit under it?

thanks

 

[Gypsy07]

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Hi Highlander!

Am I still happy with it? Well, I've just ordered a second one for my chicks due to hatch on Thursday!

Yes, after a couple of weeks use I still think it's the best thing ever. I took it away from my first five chicks and put it in with my next three chicks a couple of days ago, but at almost 3 weeks old the bigger ones could still shimmy under it (on the lowest height setting) if they wanted to. But they hardly ever did; even at night they all nestled down in the wood shavings a few inches in front of it, which probably was close enough for them to get a small amount of heat. Seeing that has just reinforced my notion that we all probably tend to mollycoddle them a bit too much when it comes to heat. Last spring I was walking my dogs in a local country park and I saw about a dozen different pairs of geese, all with tiny goslings that looked to be about a week old at most. They were all out swimming in the middle of a lochan that was so bloody cold it was painful for me to dip my hand in it...

Anyway, my younger three chicks had been using a red 60W bulb in a very small cardboard box for the first week. They seemed happy enough but as soon as I gave them the Ecoglow they shot under it and hardly came out for 12 hours. I think the security of being hidden away safely under something must be very comforting for them. Now they don't all jump up and go mental every time someone walks past their box!

As to chick numbers, the underside hotplate is 20x30 cm. Brinsea says it's good for brooding up to 20 chicks. I guess you could probably trust their figures. I mean, they're a pretty good company. Obviously 20 three week old chicks wouldn't fit under it all at once, but I think that as they get older and require less time under the heat, maybe they would rotate? My incubator only takes about 14 eggs at most so I probably won't find out for definite any time soon...

The only potential problem I noticed with it was that once my bigger chicks got to a couple of weeks old and hit the constant scrabbling phase, they were throwing around wood shavings so much that they all piled up under the Ecoglow till they were stuffed right up to the hotplate, and the chicks were too daft to dig them back out again. I had to reach in every night and rake out a ton of shavings so they could get under it if they wanted to. Easily solved by putting it on a raised platform, and I guess that answered the 'fire risk' question a few people were asking. There's no way this thing could set anything on fire. Probably not even petrol or spirits. It really is totally safe.

 

[featherz]

I still like mine too. My chicks are almost 3 weeks old and all seem happy. They squoosh under it at night but during the day they are running everywhere. My house is only about 55 right now and they seem fine. I am starting to think chicks don't need as much heat as we think - my last two hatches I used a 100W bulb in my 55 degree house and they even thought that was too hot. All survived and are big chickens now. I have my seven week old chicks out in an unheated coop and they are also fine (it was 6F this morning and they were jumping around and chest bumping when I went out there).

So far I love my ecoglow!

Oh, and I have mine on the middle setting, which seems to work for 13 chicks - I may increase that shortly.

 

[7L Farm]

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I agree that chicks don't need as much heat. I moved my week old chicks too their new 330 sq ft. penthouse "coop". Theirs 30 of them so they can ball up to stay warm. I do provide them with a red heat lamp just in case. I did put the brooder in the coop it has a door so they can go in its kinda like having a coop in a coop. They love to run around at a million miles an hour flopping their wings. The chicks do like having a place to hide in. Their also sticking their chest out at each other to determine the pecking order. So all in all its probably good for them to live in a more natural environment at a very young age. Just a thought. They also have a dirt floor which provides grit. I'm gonna find some bugs to give them next. That should be fun to watch.

 

[Highlander]

Thanks for the replies. I have 23 eggs in the bator right now, looks like I need to go out and buy a couple!

 

[Gypsy07]

Well, check out eBay before you go buy from Brinsea direct. Their price is £36 each before they add the p&p charges, but I got mine from two different eBay sellers for under £32 each including the p&p. I think the cheapest seller (by about 75 pence) was Wheatcroft Poultry. And it's definitely the new and improved model.

 

[cjexotic]

in the description it says it runs off 12v is that correct? could I run this off a battery. I have no electric in my coop. Need a 12v brooder heat lamp. thanks

 

[Highlander]

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Lol, I ALWAYS check Ebay first!

Thanks.

 

[Gypsy07]

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Well, it plugs into a normal socket and has a transformer in the plug to drop the voltage. It's not set up to run straight off a battery but that's not to say you couldn't adapt it if you had some electrical know-how. Doing anything like that would definitely invalidate Brinsea's rather good guarantee though.

How far away from your house is the coop? I just run an extension cable out to mine...

 

[Gypsy07]

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Hehe. Certified eBay junkie, hey? I almost always check eBay first but I actually went to the Brinsea site first this time because so many different people on here mentioned how Brinsea had the cheapest prices for their own stuff. Found out that was just in the US, and my faith in eBay was reaffirmed. Hope the second one arrives soon - I'm in lockdown again right now!