Talk to me about temperature and Cornish X chicks

[Didelphus]

Hi,
We've had a variety of layers for many years now but this is my first step into the world of meat birds. My chicks are 2 wks old now and I'm ready to get them outside!! We live in Louisiana but it has been unseasonably cool this winter. It is starting to warm up, though. We're looking at 30's -40's at night and 60's by day. Will my chicks be ok in a chicken tractor (nice closed in area) with a couple of heat lamps and some good bedding? I don't want to freeze them to death!
And from what I'm reading they really don't do well in the heat of summer. Is that correct? Should I not try to raise them in the dead of summer?
Thanks,
Laura

 

[chicklips]

They will be fine, the meat birds tend to run a little warmer then other birds. My birds do not do as well in the middle of summer, but they did really good in the spring and fall. I don't know the temps for you for the "dead of winter" but here it gets really cold and I don't know how well they would handle the ice, snow and neg temps.

 

[4-H chicken mom]

They should be in the 80-85 degree range. They should be fine with heat lamps. The only problem I see is the temp. swing. Unless you are able to raise the lamp during the day and then lower it at night, they will get to hot during the day and too cold at night. If you have a large enough area for them to get away from the heat when they need to, you will be fine. Try to find a happy medium. If they are piling on one another they are cold, if they are spread out away from the lamp, they are too warm. Hope this helps some. Two weeks is about all you can stand with meat birds being in a box. Good Luck.

 

[Miltonchix]

I just butchered the last of mine. The cold weather (got down to 10 a couple nights) didn't seem to have any affect other than make 'em think they were hungier. I'm not far from you in the Panhandle of FL. Keep 'em warm until they get most of their feathers and they'll do fine. Cool weather sure helps with the smell too.

 

[Didelphus]

Thanks for the input. They're just starting to get some feathers on their fat globby pink bodies (eww, these guys aren't that pretty). Right now it's like they're too fat for their own feathers to cover them.
I had them out last night and they did fine. Much better than in the baby pool on my kitchen bar! They never bother to walk out of the coop area on the tractor. They just sit....and eat. I think it will be warming up and they will be fine.
Laura

 

[scarter]

When we did ours I moved them from the house to the pole barn and stacked hay around the fencing for a couple of weeks. They would move away from the light during the day and then back under the light during the night. I just made sure the draft wasn't on them with the bales of hay.

 

[jaku]

They will be fine- I'd keep the heat lamps on them at night for awhile just to be sure though.