- Jun 14, 2013
- 109
- 5
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My chicks were going to be hatching soon so I started putting my brooder box together last night. This morning I noticed a few eggs rocking back and forth so I knew it was going to be soon, so I turned the red heat lamp I bought from Orcheln's. When I came in later to check on it I noticed the heat in the brooder was up to 140 degrees! I turned the lamp off and replaced it with just a regular 60 watt bulb. That was still too hot, going up to 110 degrees. I ran to Lowe's and bought a lamp dimmer and I've been able to get the heat down to where it needs to be now (which is good because as of this moment I have 4 chicks hatched and others trying to pull out of their shells). While at Lowe's though I saw a flood light that said it was dimmable. It was a 23W R40 soft white fluorescent bulb (120w). I asked the salesman if it would warm up and he said yes, that it was the LED bulbs that were cool. I bought it to try, but thought I would check with everyone here. Can you use fluorescent bulbs? Should I just stick with the 60w light bulb?