Well, we picked up our three chicks almost three weeks ago, and they are exactly five weeks old today. So, they are waiting on me to get the coop/run finished so they can leave their cramped brooder and enjoy their spacious home outside.
The chicks are staying in our basement, which still gets pretty cool, so I am still using the heat lamp, though it is raised enough that it’s only heating the brooder to 70 – 80 degrees F. Our daughter has been very intrigued by the chicks. In getting excited for eggs, fertilizer, insect control, and etc., I forgot all about the enjoyment animals bring young children. When we first got them, she wanted to go to the basement to say good morning and good night every morning and evening. And she always asks if she can hold them, but when I get one out for her, she doesn’t want to hold it and only wants to touch it with her single index finger. And she tells everyone her chicks are cute, but she pronounces cute as ‘coot’. We are getting enjoyment out of her enjoyment! I suppose that’s an added bonus of this backyard chicken adventure.
Here she is checking them out shortly after we brought them home …
It’s not all fun and cute and exciting though. As I previously mentioned, the chicks are ready and need to go outside, but building their home has been a time-consuming chore filled with challenge after challenge. It didn’t help that my wife went out of town for five days, and then I had a work trip that was four days, so we’ve had a lot of traveling to mess with our normal schedules. We have made a lot of progress though; the run is at a point where no more should be done until the coop is finished and positioned. The run is 8x12x6 feet, so we have plenty of room for expansion as we add to our flock of three. The below photo is from about three weeks ago. You can see our outline with some wire mesh sticking up. We buried the wire about 1.5 feet underground, since I opted not to do a wire bottom to the run. Right now the rush is on to finish the coop … the ladies are waiting … more to follow as we get the whole project finished.
