How hot? 3 week olds

[rckirby]

I wonder how chickens ever survived before electricity.

 

[needlessjunk]

I wonder how chickens ever survived before electricity.

They had their mothers

 

[Blooie]

Um, and kerosene brooder house heaters.

 

[Ol Grey Mare]

Um, and kerosene brooder house heaters.

x 2 artificial brooding is not only related to the advent and use of electricity, Frontier times would have seen chicks not being brooded by a mother hen raised in any number of places - ie near the kitchen stove, etc. - where artificial warmth would be provided. While natural brooding would have been more common, artificial brooding did occur.

 

[lazy gardener]

Artificial incubation was going on back in the days of the pyramids. (huge scale with walk in incubators. The workers would stoke the furnaces based on their finely attuned temp awareness. No thermometers or hygrometers then.) I read a story (not fiction) about a lady who would hatch eggs for her self and her neighbors. she'd keep the eggs in a basket and set them on the stone hearth. She'd feel the temp of the hearth with her foot, and slide the basket around regularly to keep the eggs at the right temp. Same with brooding. Chicks grow better, feather out faster when they don't have the confines of a brooder kept to the temp protocol of the "they say" people. My babies are 3 weeks old, and have only rarely been using their HP cave since they were 2 weeks old. They moved outside around 5 days old. Last night, I turned it off, and won't turn it on again, unless we have a cold snap.