Definition

1. Noun:
   • A heated enclosure for raising young animals, especially chicks: A brooder is a device or structure that provides controlled warmth, typically for hatching eggs or rearing young birds or other animals that require consistent temperature.
   • A person who broods: A brooder is someone who thinks deeply, persistently, and often moodily or anxiously about something.

Examples of Usage

• Noun (Apparatus):
  • The farmer moved the newly hatched chicks into the brooder to keep them warm.
  • We need to check the temperature in the chicken brooder.
• Noun (Person):
  • He's always been a brooder, worrying about every little detail.
  • Don't be such a brooder; try to think about something positive.

Advanced Usage

• "To be a brooder": To have a personality characterized by deep, often melancholic, contemplation.
  • In the novel, the protagonist is portrayed as a silent brooder, haunted by his past.

Variants and Related Words

• Brood (verb): To think deeply about something that makes one unhappy; to sit on eggs to hatch them.
  • She would often brood over her mistakes.
  • The hen broods on her eggs for weeks.
• Brooding (adjective): Showing deep, serious, and sometimes sad thought; ominously suggestive.
  • He had a dark, brooding presence.
  • The brooding clouds signaled an approaching storm.

Synonyms

• Incubator: A device for maintaining controlled conditions for hatching eggs or growing microorganisms. (Close synonym for the apparatus meaning).
• Ponderer: A person who thinks about something carefully. (Close synonym for the person meaning).
• Worrier: A person who worries excessively.

Related Phrases

• Brood over/on/about something: (Phrasal verb) To think anxiously or gloomily about something.
  • It's not healthy to brood over things you cannot change.

Noun

1. apparatus consisting of a box designed to maintain a constant temperature by the use of a thermostat; used for chicks or premature infants