Mama Heating Pad in the Brooder (Picture Heavy) - UPDATE

[ccrow]

So does that mean the littles are already in contact with the bigs? I'm confused about that part-- if so, sounds like the bigs are just ignoring them. In any case, our setup is that we have a chicken coop, and then we have a fenced area outside the coop that is just cattle panel so only 50" tall and wide openings, and there's an opening in that fence that lets the chickens out into the rest of our property for free-ranging. I was very freaked out about my littles going out the pop-door of the coop and into the fenced part, so I put chicken wire around the whole thing to keep them inside it. So, two things:

1) They didn't just immediately tear out the pop door. Once I let them roam outside the brooder pen, it took them at least a week to decide to venture out the pop door. With your setup though, it could be earlier, not sure. But once mine did go in and out, they had no trouble at all remembering/knowing how to get back inside.

2) Once they went outside the pop door, they were very careful about where they ventured for about a week, and stayed really close to the coop and went in and out a lot. Then they were ready to start exploring, and they discovered they could fly up above the chicken wire and jump back down the other side. So after the first week or so, the only chickens I was keeping in the yard were the older ones. So I opened that outer door and everyone started free ranging, again, the littles being very careful how they explored but nevertheless doing it.

So, yes, the chicken wire kept them in for another week or a bit more, but it would need to be 36 or 48 inches high to go longer than that. I made the mistake of only using 24".

You can use a nail to twist the chicken wire quickly onto your fencing if you want to do that. If you will have groups of chicks in the future it will be in their interest, but it should be 1" diameter. I figure, they grow so fast, that each week of protection they got was enabling them to survive a bit longer. So to sum up, my chicks went out the pop-door to the yard at about 3 weeks, and over the fence to the free-range at about 4 maybe 4.5 weeks. I lost one to a feral cat we are no longer being troubled by, everyone else grew up.

I reported on the exact ages and so forth here on this thread, but it's been long enough I don't remember exactly.

hope this helps,
--Victoria

Well, they are in contact with hardware cloth in between

I usually let the chickens range during the day but recently there have been coyotes around and I'm keeping them penned... I had a pullet go missing and my neighbor has lost 8 of hers. She saw a coyote cut through her horse paddock one day, while her dogs were outside- they are brazen.There have also been at least a couple of small dogs taken locally as well so I make sure my mini Aussie doesn't stay out by herself!
The fencing I have is the galvanized wire fence with 2x4 inch openings, so I will most likely have to put chicken wire on. This is my first time with the MHP method but I've raised and integrated chicks before. I'm just not sure of the timing although it seems from what I'm reading that they will be able to be in together sooner than when the chicks are in a brooder completely separate from the older birds. In the past I have used wire dog crates and pen, both of which have smaller openings in the wire, but it would be nice not to mess around with all that.

 

[Victoria-nola]

Quote:
Ok I'm getting a better picture. Sounds like you need to keep them penned in the chicken yard, so I recommend that you add the chicken wire to your fence. Thing is, it will be there into the foreseeable future and it will always keep the littles safe. The thing with the MHP is, FOR SURE, part of the whole point is that the littles integrate super early, which takes away the worries. So yeah, you'll want them to be able to safely go outside and join the flock at their youngest age, which I predict will be 3 or 4 weeks old and they'll be outside in the yard. I made the opening in our pen at 2 weeks old. The littles know to stay out of the way of the bigs, but the bigs just don't feel threatened like they will juveniles. This is the best thing ever, seriously.

I missed how old your chicks are now. Any way you could take a pic of the setup? I'm still having trouble visualizing. -- Is it that you have a pen or enclosure made of hardware cloth inside your regular enclosed coop? For all intents and purposes, if so, that is is a pen-within-a-pen. And you can cut holes in it (we put electrical or duct tape around the edge to avoid poking the littles) that the bigs can't get into. When you use it again in the future, you can just patch the holes temporarily until they are needed, that's what we're going to do. We use tin snips to cut hardware cloth.

But do tell me how old they are now. Sorry I just missed that entirely.

--V

 

[ccrow]

Ok I'm getting a better picture. Sounds like you need to keep them penned in the chicken yard, so I recommend that you add the chicken wire to your fence. Thing is, it will be there into the foreseeable future and it will always keep the littles safe. The thing with the MHP is, FOR SURE, part of the whole point is that the littles integrate super early, which takes away the worries. So yeah, you'll want them to be able to safely go outside and join the flock at their youngest age, which I predict will be 3 or 4 weeks old and they'll be outside in the yard. I made the opening in our pen at 2 weeks old. The littles know to stay out of the way of the bigs, but the bigs just don't feel threatened like they will juveniles. This is the best thing ever, seriously.

I missed how old your chicks are now. Any way you could take a pic of the setup? I'm still having trouble visualizing. -- Is it that you have a pen or enclosure made of hardware cloth inside your regular enclosed coop? For all intents and purposes, if so, that is is a pen-within-a-pen. And you can cut holes in it (we put electrical or duct tape around the edge to avoid poking the littles) that the bigs can't get into. When you use it again in the future, you can just patch the holes temporarily until they are needed, that's what we're going to do. We use tin snips to cut hardware cloth.

But do tell me how old they are now. Sorry I just missed that entirely.

--V

They are just one week old today; received them from mypetchicken.com last Thursday. (My first mail-order chicks

I've been getting them from the LFS but after three times in a row of getting 5 pullets and 1 roo I decided I needed a change!!) I'm losing daylight today but tomorrow I can take some pics and post them. Sorry I'm not better at explaining

Oh yeah, can you explain what you meant about using a nail to twist the chicken wire on?

 

[HaloAmanda]

I logged in to ask about using a heating pad for chicks and this was top of the list. Beautiful. My chicks are in a make shift brooder on corner of my coop and weather has been so hot I had switched to a smaller bulb and temps dropped below 60 last night and I ran out this morning to find all the chicks huddled under the light trampling over my smallest silkie chick. She was quite out of it and not walking right and I did not expect her to make it thru the day but I had to get to work to my surprise she was much better on my lunch break but I plan to set her up inside tonight for a couple days with another one or 2 of the smaller chicks. I don't have a spare light at the moment but wanted to put them in a small cage with a heating pad. This seems perfect.

 

[HaloAmanda]

Not nearly as nice as yours, no press n sea on hand but threw together in 5 mins for an emergency

 

[Little Fuzzy]

I saw one at Tracter Supply that didn't have the auto shut off, and it seemed reasonably priced, but I did not look at the quality.

 

[woods79]

well our 14 week olds that stayed warm with a MHP are doing great

 

[kblod66]

Here are a few of the 15 three week old chicks that have been using the MHP since day one!

 

[Victoria-nola]

Not nearly as nice as yours, no press n sea on hand but threw together in 5 mins for an emergency

Great job! It's not what it looks like that matters.

You can set the whole thing up (or a bigger one) out in the coop for everyone. They go in and out and regulate their own temperatures that way.

This is the pad folks here recommend generally:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005NZ66KU/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It is nice and large, has a setting to prevent it shutting off, and has 6 levels of heat.

Wishing you well.

--V

 

[Victoria-nola]

Quote:
Ok, one week old. You'll see that by the time they are 2 weeks old, using this method of the MHP combined with being contained within the main coop, they'll be really interested in exploring further and having more room. imo, the chicks mature faster using this method-- they have a chance to engage themselves as chickens and engage in all the usual behaviors. It's more natural, having them more easily integrate at young age.

Nail to twist the wire on: It's an old farmer trick. You position the chicken wire where you want it against the wire fence, then take a smooth nail around 3" long (but you might experiment with the length), insert the nail between the top of the chicken wire and one of the cross-wires of the wire fence (so that the nail is perpendicular to the fencing), and spin the nail, then pull out the nail and move to another spot. It causes the chicken wire to wind around the wire fence. It's harder to describe than to actually do, it becomes clear when you try it. It's incredibly easy and fast. Then you do it near the bottom. However, I've used that method a lot and the windings can come apart over time. It's good to do some supplementary zipties especially at the ends. But also, I just remembered that it's really hard to do it with 1" chicken wire-- it works great with 2", but that won't keep your chicks inside the fence as reliably.

The other option is nylon zipties-- you want the black, UV-protected ones. You can get bags of 800-1000 in Lowe's or Home Depot that are much cheaper than buying multiple packages of smaller amounts. For this purpose, the 4" ties would work fine, but you have to have very good fine motor movement to utilize 4" ties very easily, so sometimes just using 8" ties is easier. The tail ends that are left can pose a danger to little eyes, so I recommend putting the tail ends on the outside of the field fence, not inside the yard. They can also be trimmed off with wire snips.

I've had zipties on fencing out of doors for 10 years and more and the zipties still hold up.

--V