First off, WHEW, I finished. It feels like I ran a marathon over the last week or so, reading through all 142 pages of this very informative thread. It became a challenge, rather than a necessity, as I figured out what I was going to do within the first 50 pages.
I am planning to get 4 day-old hens for the first time in late March and brood them in a Rubbermaid 18-gallon tote for the first 3 weeks in a spare bathroom, away from our two cats. When they outgrow that, I hope to get a watermellon box from our local Costco and place it on a tarp in the unheated playroom in the garage. My hope is by mid-April it will be warm enough in there that the heat lamp is sufficient. They may even have enough feathers to go outside occasionally. I'm confident that a wattermellon box will be big enough to keep them to 8 weeks, when they hopefully can go into their new coop, once it's built.
This thread has been very helpful and all the folks here are not only creative but helpful as well. I think I will like it here.
Thank you all for all you've done to educate new chicken raisers...
Richard
Seattle, WAish
