Is our heater set too high or something?

[Mike521]

Over the past week I've noticed most of our chicks (about 1 month old) aren't sleeping under the heater as much. Our AC is set to 73 so I thought they'd still want heat for a week or two more. The heater is angled so they can get a low end or a high end if they want.

It's my first time raising chicks so I just want to make sure they're comfy. Maybe this is a perfectly normal signal that they're almost ready to move outdoors 24/7? Nighttime temps are around 65 right now so I was thinking at least 2 more weeks before we take that step. They're spending daytime outside and they love it (80 - 85 degrees lately)

Bonus question - since we switched to outside all day, they're eating much less crumbles. I didn't think they'd possibly find that much food (bugs) in our 12x16 chicken run. Guess I was wrong? They spend all day dust bathing, sometimes napping, and lots zooming around enjoying themselves. I don't think they're that good at digging for bugs yet

Thanks all

 

[Debbie292d]

Sometimes we have some batches of chicks that are wussies and want the heat until they are over 6-weeks old. Other times, they are 3-4 weeks and moving to the other side already. It's a sign, yep!

We have 5-week old chicks staying outside and nighttime temps 55-60F. We have a cozy coop radiant heater for the 55F nights, but there's 11 of them and them huddled up in that hutch gets quite warm in there without it.

Bonus point question: Make mash by putting crumbles in a small dish and soak them with water, then set them down. They will consume that.

 

[rosemarythyme]

^ Good advice above!

The chicks are telling you they don't want/need the supplemented heat. At 1 month old, assuming they're standard chicks they can easily handle being down into the low 40s by my own experience, if allowed to acclimate to it.

Given your nighttime temps vs indoor temps you can move them directly outside now without further acclimating.

 

[Mike521]

Thanks @Debbie292d and @rosemarythyme! Glad to hear this is a good sign I had seen lots of charts online that basically said they need heat till 8 weeks and I thought that was long. I spent many years working on a farm, and by this size the chicks didn't look to their mom's for warmth anymore

Sidenote, I made them a dish of moistened crumbles just now and they loved it! Wish I knew about this sooner!

 

[Debbie292d]

Thanks @Debbie292d and @rosemarythyme! Glad to hear this is a good sign I had seen lots of charts online that basically said they need heat till 8 weeks and I thought that was long. I spent many years working on a farm, and by this size the chicks didn't look to their mom's for warmth anymore

Sidenote, I made them a dish of moistened crumbles just now and they loved it! Wish I knew about this sooner!

It's always better to be safe than sorry, as cold chicks/chickens can become sick chicks/chickens.

Overall, this is the guideline we're all taught from the beginning, then we just do our own thing as the chicks adjust, but mostly we adjust, and learn. Ours are usually a week ahead of this. I start out at the top getting them from 95F to 90F in a couple of days. When I've had a weak one, I fire the incubator back up, set it to 95F, and let them bask in there for a day.

 

[aart]

Overall, this is the guideline we're all taught from the beginning, then we just do our own thing as the chicks adjust, but mostly we adjust, and learn. Ours are usually a week ahead of this. I start out at the top getting them from 95F to 90F in a couple of days. When I've had a weak one, I fire the incubator back up, set it to 95F, and let them bask in there for a day.

This is another one of those 'rules of thumb' that are not actually accurate. Best to go by behaviors rather than a rigid chart.

 

[Ridgerunner]

You can see all kinds of charts and rules of thumb on this forum. Like many public forums people can publish what they want. The monitors on this forum try to keep us safe but a lot of this is opinion and we can have a wide variety of opinions. It's hard to police opinions. Some of mine are fairly unpopular with many people.

Most of the charts and rules of thumb are extremely safe, often overkill. That describes my opinion of that temperature chart. If you follow it you will not have any problems with them being too cold. That doesn't even apply to their entire environment. They can typically handle temperatures much colder than those as long as they have a place to go warm up when they need to. There are a lot of nuances that never make it to those charts.

I've had chicks younger than 6 weeks go through nights below freezing with no supplemental heat. I've had broody hens wean their chicks by 3 weeks of age and leave them on their own to make their way with the flock, including them spending the night without the broody or anything else providing supplemental heat, day or night. I don't recommend this across the board, there are nuances to these. The broody hen had spent 3 weeks integrating her chicks and the nights were pretty warm. The others had been acclimated to cold weather, they were not thrown from tropical heat to freezing weather.

All of this to say that I would expect your 4-week-old chicks to do great in your AC without any supplemental heat. They should be able to handle your nighttime lows outside but I would not blame you for taking it slowly. It is also important for you to feel comfortable with them out there.

Bonus question - since we switched to outside all day, they're eating much less crumbles. I didn't think they'd possibly find that much food (bugs) in our 12x16 chicken run. Guess I was wrong? They spend all day dust bathing, sometimes napping, and lots zooming around enjoying themselves. I don't think they're that good at digging for bugs yet

Is your run bare dirt, thick bedding, or still grass and weeds? They don't just eat bugs when foraging. They can eat a lot of plant matter. They can also get a lot of nutrition eating bits of stuff on the ground. Before they were domesticated they had to manage eating for themselves. They still need access to age appropriate chicken feed since we keep them restricted and confined but many of us that pasture chickens see a drop in the amount of chicken feed they eat.

 

[Mike521]

Thanks all! @Ridgerunner, our run is bare dirt, basically fresh topsoil we bought at home depot. Then I read about sand and we're thinking about adding a couple inches of that eventually. But for now it's just dirt

There were a handful of twigs poking out trying to grow into shrubs, but the chicks made nice salad out of them lol