If my baby chicks are quiet...

[rosemarythyme]

It got cold in the garage last night, 66 ambient temp - 84 under the plate, where they hung out

But adorably, when I visited them in the early hours they woke right up and popped right out to walk around a bit and eat.

We are getting a space heater today because the next few mornings are cold. Will make it nice and toasty for them!

If it's 66 they really don't need it. It doesn't do them favors to keep them "toasty" and 66 isn't at all cold for them (I'd consider that fantastic daytime highs for 1 week olds). You only need it to stay above 50F if the heat plate specifies that as the suggested bottom range of operation.

 

[MamaWolf4]

A thermometer does not work with a brooder plate. Brooder plates do not work by warming the ambient air, they work by contact heat. The chicks lay under them and put their backs/feathers against them (the same way that a mother hen would).

This is an article that was quoted by "A Farmish Life":

A chick heat plate is meant to mimic a mama hen. The chicks press their backs up against the heat plate to keep warm, just like they’d do to the skin/feathers underneath their mama hen. The “heat” of the plate is adjusted by raising or lowering the plate. There is no need to place a thermometer under the heat plate (like you might in a brooder with a heat lamp) because the plate doesn’t throw heat the same way a lamp does. Your chicks’ behavior will tell you if they’re too hot, too cold, or just right.

• If they refuse to go underneath it, the heat plate is either too low for them to fit underneath, or it’s too low and the space beneath it is too warm.
• If they refuse to come out from underneath it at all (and they’re constantly chirping in an unhappy way) it generally means they’re too cold. Lower the plate a couple clicks.
• If they’re in and out, eating and drinking and sleeping and hanging out while making happy chick noises, you’ve probably got the plate at the right height. A good tip is to adjust the legs so that one side of the heat plate sits lower than the other (so it looks like the plate is at a diagonal to the brooder floor.) By doing this, you will provide an option of comfortable heights. Smaller chicks can hang out where the plate is lower to the ground and still be warm while chicks that are bigger/growing faster can hang out where they have a little more room.
• The chick heat plate needs to be raised as the chicks grow, so pay attention to the chicks’ behaviors to know when they need a little more space.

 

[thistlewick]

Yep, I've angled it and they are happy little bugs today, busy busy busy in and out, eating, drinking.

The runt! is a little bully, constantly pecking at the beaks of the others, which I find interesting and hilarious.

 

[thistlewick]

Chick update!

They are doing fantastic so crossing fingers! Running all around, jumping/flying up to the top of the heater plate, drinking, eating like hogs and exploring the whole brooder.

Thursday I am going to a local farm to get some more chicks to complete my flock! 4 more chicks incoming!

 

[RoyalChick]

Chick update!

They are doing fantastic so crossing fingers! Running all around, jumping/flying up to the top of the heater plate, drinking, eating like hogs and exploring the whole brooder.

View attachment 3830918View attachment 3830919

Thursday I am going to a local farm to get some more chicks to complete my flock! 4 more chicks incoming!

I use a similar heat plate. One suggestion for you is to get a carboard tray (like the ones cans of cat food come in). Use a box cutter to make some holes where the top part of your brooder plate legs stick up and pop it on top of the plate.
Put some shavings in the tray and in no time it will be your chick’s favorite hang out.
They love being on top of the plate and it won’t get covered in poop because it is protected by the cardboard tray.
They will still go under the plate to warm up but will spend a lot of the day jumping up and hanging out on top.

 

[NorthwoodsChick]

If it's 66 they really don't need it. It doesn't do them favors to keep them "toasty" and 66 isn't at all cold for them (I'd consider that fantastic daytime highs for 1 week olds). You only need it to stay above 50F if the heat plate specifies that as the suggested bottom range of operation.

x2. I brooded chicks in my garage with ambient temps in the teens at night and 30sF in daylight. I used a heat lamp on a chain to warm the space to about 50F then the heat plate. No pasty butt- no losses. Feathered faster and weaned off heat by 4 weeks and in the integration pen same week.
All healthy at 6 weeks.

 

[thistlewick]

x2. I brooded chicks in my garage with ambient temps in the teens at night and 30sF in daylight. I used a heat lamp on a chain to warm the space to about 50F then the heat plate. No pasty butt- no losses. Feathered faster and weaned off heat by 4 weeks and in the integration pen same week.
All healthy at 6 weeks.

We didn't do the heater and much to my delight when I visited them at 6am bright and early it was 60 degrees in the garage and they were out and about already, eating and darting about.

All my worries were for nothing! haha!

 

[RoyalChick]

We didn't do the heater and much to my delight when I visited them at 6am bright and early it was 60 degrees in the garage and they were out and about already, eating and darting about.

All my worries were for nothing! haha!

Yeah. Like you I worried like crazy about heat. My last lot went out into the coop with their heat plate and temperatures immediately dropped to the low 40s at night.
They didn’t even seem to notice they were so excited about all the new space they had to explore. I think they were about 10 days old.