Do Baby Chicks REALLY Need All That Heat?

[Stephanie739]

Quote:
This is what I would do too.

I'm kind of leaning towards the idea that too much heat on the babies is not always the best for them. Mamas probably do know best (most of the time!)

 

[Ok12346]

When I had babies without a mother hen, I've always used a brooder with a heat lamp and followed the standard heating guidelines (95 deg in week 1, 90 deg in week 2, 85 deg in week 3 and so on till they can tolerate room temps).


But when I have broodies to take care of the chicks, I have the family in the house and they do just fine from hatching day with no heat whatsoever. It is about 72 degrees in my house right now, though at night it goes down to about 65 degrees.


On hatching day, the babies do seem to spend alot of time underneath their broody mother, sleeping.


But on day 2 onward, I have watched them most or all of the day outside of Momma's feathered blanket. They play, eat, scratch, poop, interact with each other and with Momma -- all of it in room temperature, with no sign of being too cold.


Right now, I have three babies that are 10 and 9 days old, and it is 72 degrees in their play room. They are in a large dog wire cage, so there is nothing that is there to help keep them warmer than the ambient room temp.


And they just playing, lively. They are NOT cold.


This has got me thinking: do the motherless babies REALLY need as much heat as the guidelines suggest?

If you raise chicks outside it gets them use to the weather which I’ve noticed they don’t need heat if they get use to the weather I mean my broody hens don’t sit on the chicks during the day besides maybe once for a few mins but other then that they don’t get heat from her besides at night and chicks don’t need all the heat people say they do I mean I raise chicks outside (under 1 week old) without no heat and it gets to around 50-60 degrees at night and they use there own body heat to stay warm and they stay warm enough and it gets them use to the cold faster so then you don’t gotta wait for them to be fully feathers to move them or nothing I mean by 2-4 weeks old they start roosting if they can some don’t tho but a lot does and don’t get cold that much and does a lot better then chicks you raise inside with heat I mean the hen and chicks use body heat so why not let the chicks use there body heat just make sure they can get somewhere at night where no wind is hitting them and there do just fine if you want chickens that survives better then anything then you gotta let them use there own body heat and stuff like that and just feed them and give them water and should be just fine but people don’t understand chicks adapt to the weather pretty fast I mean I’ve had hens hatch chicks in winter and the chicks 1-2 weeks old was in like 30 degrees if not less and just running around cause they get adapted to the cold and people say there’d die in 30 degrees but they won’t If they get use to but don’t raise chicks without a hen in winter or if it gets less then 50 degrees if the chicks are under a week old they can stay warm with there own body heat to a certain point tho so u gotta be careful about how cold it gets if the chicks are newly hatched but I’ve been raising chicks without no heat for a few years now and it’s I’ve always had success with it ofc some will pass away and those would be weaker chicks you don’t want you want the strongest ones so they do better at surviving and not needing you for stuff and in general does better