tucking themselves in

So I was all worried that the chicks wouldn't learn how to put themselves in their house at night before we left on our trip. I was putting them manually in every night because otherwise it would get dark and they would just end up sleeping wherever they happened to be at night. When we were away last weekend, I ended up checking the webcam and realized that they had learned how to use the ramp and were consistently going in to sleep when it got dark. I was quite amazed - I thought they would be the slowest learners in the world. Here they are on the webcam at 8:20pm tonight marching up the ramp.

Almost done

Despite the hot weather over the weekend, we forced ourselves to finish the run in the nick of time since we'll be out of town next weekend and needed to make sure the chicks could survive by themselves for 3 days. Still a few things left like a ramp to help them get back into the coop at night (We had to manually put them back in last night). Still needs a real roof but that can wait for a while assuming it doesn't rain.

heat wave

As you can imagine, the heat wave is hitting the chicks hard since they are out in the coop and don't have a run yet. I rushed home yesterday when I saw in the webcam that they had knocked over their water and were panting heavily. Today, I put in frozen bottles of water that they could lie on (though looks like they have mostly melted now) and a little tub of extra water. I also stuck a fan in there though they are really afraid of it and stay far away. Buffy seems to be using the little tub as her wading pool now and despite being the most feathered chick, she doesn't seem to be suffering as much today as a result. Maybe I need a bigger wading pool for them.

One more weekend

The frame for the run was completed this weekend. Roofing and wire is left and only 1 more weekend to go!

Moving on in

We moved the chicks into the coop this weekend but then I got all nervous b/c it was 50 degrees at night so I moved the heat lamp and webcam out there as well so I could check on them. They slept under the heat lamp all night so I guess they will need it for a while. They also don't like being in the dark (apparently chickens don't have good night vision) but hopefully I can wean them off the light when they get older.

Coop almost done.

Hitting the home stretch with the coop but we do still need to build a run.

Week 5: looking feathered

The chicks are getting more feathered now and buffy is 2 times the size of the other two it seems or maybe it's just all her puffiness.

They also know how to roost pretty well now.