Stressful start with first time flock

[Perris]

cute!

 

[Chad Brantly]

Search this forum for posts about brooding chicks outside. I have done this the last 3 sets of chicks I’ve had...one of them even in the fall where night time temps were in the 40s...with nothing more than a standard heating pad in the brooder (look for posts about mama heating pad). The chicks have done fantastic and I have not lost a single one using this method. The feather out faster and are more quickly introduced to the rest of the flock. I highly recommend. So much easier, cleaner, and healthier chicks. If you watch chicks that hatch with broody hens they are fine in whatever the outdoor temps are and simply return periodically to warm up under their mother. They do not need a completely warm environment, just an area they can go to warm up periodically.

 

[Sea Wolf]

Despite the negativity for plastic totes, it's what I use. Large ones with lids. I also cut the entire top out of the lids and insert a cut to fit piece of chicken wire. That goes back on the tote when they start jumping. I also use the red heat lamp. You have to understand what you have and what it will do. I have no losses at all and no sick chicks. Pine shavings on the bottom. The red lamp is at least 3 feet away from the chicks and aimed at one end of the tote. The temp is tested at the bottom of the tote where the chicks are with a thermometer. The totes are easily sterilized and washable. When they outgrow that, they get moved into a hand taped together cardboard enclosure that is big enough for them until they go outside. They are little and cute but they are tougher than you think. Try not to over think it.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

I used red heat lamps for years in Ohio brooders.

Then it dawned on my that using heat lamps didn't allow providing a daily dark period for the chicks. A light/dark cycle is vital for all earth bound creatures' circadian well being. I then switched out all the red lamps with ceramic heat emitters.

Some people here urged me to consider a heat plate but I fought it due to the initial cost. But then I did the math. I realized one of my Ohio brooders with 2 heat lamps cost me as much in electricity during the course of a single brooding as the smallest Premier1 heat plate. Duh! Realizing that, I bought 2 heat plates.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

double post

 

[Willowspirit]

It didn't occur to me that i could use a cardboard box until i saw a cardboard box advertised with a bunch of other stuff for $90 on a website. We had plenty of boxes in all shapes and sizes from moving and ordering online, so yay! Worked very well.

 

[Sea Wolf]

When I use the cardboard boxes, I make more of a corral. I take a plastic shower curtain and put that on the floor underneath. Shavings go on top of that. Keeps the floor clean and makes cleanups very easy. I sometimes have had 40 chicks so you can imagine the potential mess. Wen they start jumping on top of the water and food dispensers and then making a break for the top edge of the cardboard they either get booted outside or, if it's too cold still, the top gets covered with netting to prevent escapees.

Check dumpsters behind places that sell TVs or appliances. The cardboard from those places lasts forever.

 

[Jack Speese]

I've always brooded chicks using a securely hung heat lamp (2 lamps in bad weather in case a bulb blew) and a circular draft guard 6 ft in diameter, or in a black snake-proof home-made brooder with a wire mesh bottom and top. It was large enough so that my chicks (I'd brood as many as 25 at a time) had plenty of space and ventilation up to 4 weeks old. I kept them in it at least that long because a black snake can eat a bird the size of a full-grown quail. I often brooded them only at night when daytime temperatures were warm. If I used the circular draft guard method, I removed it once the chicks were older and started getting wing feathers, as I didn't want them to fly over it. By then they were old enough and large enough to find their way back to their food, water and heat. I always had good luck. I'd lose an occasional chick now and then, sometimes even at a later age. It is always upsetting and worrisome, but it happens. I also recommend starting with good stock, i.e., getting chicks from a NPIP-certified hatchery.

 

[Mary Chapman]

I would suggest Save-A-Chick from Rural King Give them the Probiotics. Sometimes they get pasty butt too. Also in 4H they suggest to give chicks 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar to 1 gallon of water.

 

[tpatricco]

I would suggest Save-A-Chick from Rural King Give them the Probiotics. Sometimes they get pasty butt too. Also in 4H they suggest to give chicks 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar to 1 gallon of water.

Thanks! I've been doing the ACV. Will get some of the probiotics.