With the turkey eggs due to hatch next week, we needed a place to raise the young birds. Our regular home built brooder does not have enough room to house 100+ birds, so we decided to build a new one, supersized! Instead of building a brooder itself, we converted a stall of the barn into a giant brooder. This gives them a nice 12x12 space to explore, grow, and run around.
The conversion was easier than expected. I simply screwed a support 2x6 on each wall (2x6 is an overkill but I had those on hand, they are the normal stall divider walls). Then put one right across the middle. The old metal roofing panels from the chicken coop (see a previous post) are exactly 12 feet long so they fit nicely as a ceiling. That provided a nice solid metal ceiling to keep predators (cats) out. Then I covered the front bars with chicken wire, and the door also. That completed a safe space. For bedding, first I used a bale of straw to cover the bare ground, then about 6 large bags of shavings. That gave a base of 4 to 6 inches across the entire floor. A 2x12 across the bottom of the doorway served to hold the bedding in while opening the door.
The heat is provided by two hanging 250Watt heat lamps and reflectors. They are hung on bailing wire from two nails in the center ceiling brace. An extension cord stapled carefully along the inside provides safe electricity from outside the stall. The last light in the back is a daylight fluorescent bulb on a timer. This provides a close approximation to daylight for 12 hours a day, and a darker night time. The heat lamps still glow but the bright white light is off at night. I have a theory that this helps to prepare the young birds for the daytime cycles better than either constant dark or light. Since bird's hormones are regulated by hours of daylight, I feel its important to have as close as possible to the outside world, even in the brooder.
So there it is. All that is left to do is to hang a couple of waterers and its usable. The entire process took an afternoon with my wonderful Wifes helping hand.
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| View from the back corner |
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| Here you see the chicken wire stapled behind the stall bars |
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| Wiring for the heat lights and daylight bulb |
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| Shot of the lowered ceiling |
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| The 2x12 holding bedding inside when the door opens |
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