Going to keep the baby chicks this time!

match-nickel

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So my wife is a 4K teacher. For the past 14 years, she has incubated chicks in a small incubator in her classroom. She usually only gets 2-4 chicks out of it. I have been threathening to keep them for years! Usually I give them to the farmer down the street.

She usually keeps them for a couple of weeks in a make-shift brooder made out of a bird cage and a heat lamp. My first step here is to make a more permanent brooder that will keep the chicks happier than the bird cage brooder (this will be kept in her clasroom for a couple of weeks then come home till we put them in a coop/run). I was donted an old dresser from a friend, and we will be starting the brooder-build-out this week! I'll try and take lots of good pics so I can get everyones input.

The chicks have about 11 more days till the incubator says they will hatch. Most likely I will go to the local hatchery and get a few more chicks around the same time. Does anyone have any input as to whether or not I can add baby chicks to the chicks that hatch at home? If I add them in within a day or two of them hatching?

Thanks!
 
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Hello and welcome to BYC
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Glad you joined us!
 
Greetings from Kansas, match-nickel, and
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! Pleased you joined us! Good luck to you and your new hatchlings!
 


So here is the dresser I started out with for the Brooding box. Figured, it is the perfect size to keep either in my wife's class, or in our house for 6 weeks or so.


Took out the drawer slides and partitions, and put in a new partition to make 2 levels of brooding box. Since the internets told me that my baby chicks need 1-2 sqft of space each, and the dresser is only 16" x 30" that only leaves me room for 3.33 chicks per level...

I added a "track" for a piece of plexi glass under the top level so as not to have chicks pooping on other chicks heads :)

I made the bottom level, and left a slot under the Hardware cloth for another piece of plexi glass so as not to get chick poop on the floor.

Top door made and installed.

Bottom door made and installed.

Doors installed and heat lamps added. I also installed a dimmer switch to the lamps so I cna adjust the cooking temp of the babies :)

This weekend my sons and I will be apinting it with some chalkboard paint that my little sister donated. I will add pics when we finish!

Input would be greatly appreciated!!! I am new to this!
 

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