Let's see photos of your brooders!

[roostereggs]

8x8x4, 2x2 foot door right next to me I can open and put in feed or step into without chicks getting out. I have 18 6-weekers in there with plenty of room and they will be moving out in 2 weeks. The lid I am holding up is reused hardware...the window was a cat door for a sliding glass door that we whacked the door off of. I hang a 5 gallon waterer with chicken nipples inside and a lamp from a chain so I can easily change the temp in there. Also a ladder style roost.
Since the photo we put it on heavy casters, so it is portable but lives in our workshop for now. I also have a stool so I can sit in there and play with them.

 

[lazy gardener]

BK: You've got me thinking. I'll be brooding 7 layers and up to a dozen meaties this spring. I have a 3 x 6 tractor that I may use, but... hay is certainly versatile!!! Gotta love the versatility of cattle panels also!!

 

[lazy gardener]

Roostereggs: Wow!

 

[Shanty]

Lazy Gardener -- a "kit box" is simply a pen designed to house 15-20 Rollers for competition.



It can be a "kit box" raised off the ground, as in the example above. Or it can be what we call a "walk-in kit box" as in the one I converted to a "brooder pen" for my chickens, below.



Check out the National Birmingham Roller Club site for more info on "competition" Rollers.

Shannon

 

[lazy gardener]

Oh. I have a friend who raises and shows pidgeons. I assume that a roller is a type of pidgeon. I just thought their housing was called a coop!

 

[AZHotChicks]

This is topped with plywood to keep in the heat and opened according to ambient temps. These meat chicks arrived in March and temps were 30s at night, 40-50s in the day. As they grow, the bales are just opened up to allow them into the rest of the coop while the bales are kept in place in the corners and along the walls to block the wind and the heat lamp is still kept in the brooder at night for warmth until they no longer need it.

 

[AZHotChicks]

I admit it I'm not handy. So just bought one and I love it!

Best feature is the food and water go outside the cage so the little bugger can't poop in it all the time. It also has an optional auto water that I got so the chicks dont run out of water. Its is also tall enough to put the plastic chick feeders/ waters from the feed store in there and still shut the top.

We have 100 day old baby chicks in there and they have a lot more room to roam than I thought they would.

The brooder was $240 and only $25 or so to deliver from Rural King. Im sure lots of other places carry them as well.


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Two things I think are drawbacks...you have to be careful to adjust the plexiglass windows low enough so the chicks cannot escape. We had a couple jail birds before getting this fine tuned.

The water bucket is too heavy to put on top of the brooder so we put ours on a stool nearby.

The heater is only in the back so the chicks were piled up in the back. We opened the middle of the brooder up and put a couple lights on the sides. You will probably only need to do this if you have a lot of chicks.

If its on the ground you have to stoop down to play with the chicks. I'm getting a shelf kit from home depot and going to put the 2 sections side by side to form a 4 ft square and cover it with a piece of plywood to put the brooder on it.

The brooder is also expandable and can be put of wheels for easy moving.

Here is what it looks like with all all 5 brooders stacked:



I'm sure you can probably make one for less, but this one works great and is good for those of who can''t swing a hammer worth a darn!

 

[butterflygrooves]

We built this brooder yesterday, it's 8x3x2. We are in our first hatch right now (4 hatched, 29 to go) and I'm not quite sure where to put the lamp, I currently have it hanging as high as I can inside the brooder but don't know how safe that is. Advice?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Put a thermometer under it and see what temperature it is keeping it under there. as long as it is 90 degrees at your coolest time, you are good to go. If it is less than 90 degrees, lower it until you get there. If it is a little over 90, don't worry too much. They just will move away from it some to get their comfort zone. Let them do the work

I can't tell for sure how it is secured. Make very sure it cannot fall. I use a wire firmly attached.

 

[MamaKitty913]

As you can see we are a work in progress here, but the cat test so far is good. LOL! He's even got the Murray McMurray cat-olog. We have 2 105 Qt. totes with ceramic light fixture attached to a dimmer switch. Thermometer readings with a 100 watt bulb in the 82 degree range on a day with rain and outside temp of 22! With a 150 watt clear bulb we got into the 105 degree range. The dimmer switch will help to increase or decrease our temp's! Still have to do the lid to allow for air flow and I'm unsure how much heat the chicks themselves will put off?! But we (God willing) should be good! Hoping that for the first week 25 will fit, but have the second brooder ready to go just in case and to be ready for growth!