i was upstairs and could hear lots of chirping...I knew something was up. Went downstairs to find one of my week old chicks on my basement floor. I have th brooder up on a freezer abut 2 feet off the floor. Hope she didn't hurt herself. Does this happen alot . What should I do to prvent this from happening again?
Chicks are fairly resilient, so she should be okay. But to prevent this in the future, maybe put some chicken wire or hardware cloth over the top of the brooder.
Oh yea, they will want to explore just like puppies! Cover the top or you will find poo all over the place! I have one brooder on the floor with a hen, they always fly over leaving me gifts... My other brooder has older chicks with a cover on a table. Every time I clean it though, they fly and go for a walk, lol. My ducks are in the garage, the water and poo mess just isn't containable in a brooder. They are in an extra large dog kennel. Soon will be outside in a 10ft by 4ft pen.
I have two galvanized feed troughs I'm using as brooders, they're side by side in the barn. One has nine cornish cross that are six weeks old (really too old to be in the brooder, moving out tomorrow), the other has barred rock and rir chicks, some six weeks, some three weeks. When I went out to feed tonight all the CX were sleeping in a big pile like normal, the layers were in three seperate piles. I was topping off the feeder and realized I was short a barred rock . Then I reached in to take the meaties' feeder for the night and see some black in the middle of the pile! It was my missing barred rock---she'd hopped the side and was warm and cozy under two plus pound meaties. I'm just glad they didn't suffocate her, they're now sooo much bigger. If I weren't going to move them tomorrow, I'd just lay some wire, or we have expanded metal panels, on top.
I didn't have the heart to keep the girls in their brooder when they started getting to the edge and roosting at the top. I had a huge roll of builders paper so I ran it across my bathroom floor and covered the entire room putting the brooder on top. There isn't anything in there they can get hurt with at all so that doesn't worry me. My bathroom has a double sliding door closet with mirrored doors. They really like to get up there and stare at themselves. My daughter and I are wearing flip flops to go into the bathroom now. Small price to pay for such cute chickies.
Quote:My bathroom is my brooder room, too, and I have never covered the brooders. I love it when they have their little milestone behaviors: making it to the brooder edge. Making it to the floor. Back into the brooder by themselves. Peering into the shiny chrome of the sink faucet... I cheer 'em on. Bathrooms are easy to clean. Small price to pay for the entertainment value and their glee at learning new things.
I was using a very large cardboard box. Until they figured out that if they got the cardboard wet, that made it soft, and they promptly pecked their way to freedom. They are now in the confines of the coop. Darn chicks.
