Raising Chickens from Day-Old Chicks: Brooding and Early Management

Setting Up a BrooderA brooder is a warm, sheltered, secure environment for chicks that provides supplemental heat equivalent to what a mother hen would provide. The simplest brooder: a large cardboard box, plastic storage container, or purpose-built timber box; a heat lamp or ceramic heat emitter providing 35°C at chick level for the first week; bedding of pine shavings (not newspaper, which is slippery and causes leg problems); and waterers and feeders sized for chicks (adult sizes allow chick…