Meat Bird Chicks

Here's our new chick brooder set up. The Gman had the base already built for another project.....so all he had to do was put up the side boards. This will work MUCH better for us than the cardboard brooders we have been building!

When the chicks are old enuf to move down to the barn, we will just stand this brooder on end and lean it up against one wall of the shop.

Looking at that pic, can u see what is wrong? With the chicks I mean?

See how most of them are piled up under the lights? That means they were too cold. They are trying to get warm by huddling together under the heat lamps.

To correct this, I dropped the lights down a bit, to get them closer to the chicks.

If you find most of your chicks huddled around the Perimeter of the brooder, this would mean the chicks are too hot and are trying to find the coolest place. In that case, you would move the lights up a bit.

It's all kind of finicky until you get the heat lamps at the right height. Watch your chicks carefully and check on them often. Adjust the lights as you need to.

You want it to be 95F under the lights.....

Once the lights are at the right height, you will find some of the chicks under the lights, some around the edges and some eating and drinking. This is a good thing!

I feel like I am running an Animal Day Care around this joint!

Between pigs, hens, a wolf, a kitten and now these chicks, it seems all I am doing is running around making sure everyone is ok, ha!

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