Friday 24 February 2012

Moving Chicks to Brooder Pen ~ Empty Nest Syndrome!

Yes, we moved the little chicks out to the brooder pen yesterday...so empty nest syndrome has settled in.  No checking the sleeping chicks before I go to bed, no waking up to little peep peep peep!  The house is darker when I get up in the night to use the washroom...no chicken light streaming out of the homeschool room!
I've started one more batch of eggs in the Hova Bator, but just now realized the temperature may have been a little low...so I increased it.  Hope I didn't just waste a bunch of eggs and made them all rotten.

Here's some photos of the chicks at 12 days and 8 days old moving into the brooder pen.
Little Licorice likes to perch

They were unsure what to do with all the room they had at first...now they are running around 
very happy!  
My hubby made a collapsible enclosure for them with old plywood.  A pentagon shape, with one side that swings open.  Plywood on the bottom as well, it's important they have warm feet. 
 We put down empty feedbags that we had cut open, then shavings and they are scratching and fluffing themselves very contentedly.  Sometimes you need to watch they don't eat the shavings.  Keep them clean so you don't get disease and check their behinds for stuck on poop.
Temperature is good, under the heat lamp is around 100, but further away it gets cooler.  
If they are hundled together all the time, they are cold. 
 If they are spread out that is good.  If they are lying there panting, way too hot!  haha

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