First time staying outside overnight!

[Glenna Fay]

My 8 chicks are 6 weeks old, and I’m wondering if they can finally stay outside, overnight, in their coop? The temperature today (Maryland) is 80 degrees, and the low for the night will be 60 degrees..... My follow-up question is, when I do transition them to the outdoors, must I close the coop door? Their coop (house portion) has an attached, small run area that is totally enclosed by hardware cloth. In addition, I have fortified any/all “gaps”. (They also have a secondary, larger run area that my son & I added, which will definitely be closed-off in the evenings, as it was our first DIY project, and not “perfect”.) Thank you, in advance, for any responses

 

[DobieLover]

My 8 chicks are 6 weeks old, and I’m wondering if they can finally stay outside, overnight, in their coop? The temperature today (Maryland) is 80 degrees, and the low for the night will be 60 degrees..... My follow-up question is, when I do transition them to the outdoors, must I close the coop door? Their coop (house portion) has an attached, small run area that is totally enclosed by hardware cloth. In addition, I have fortified any/all “gaps”. (They also have a secondary, larger run area that my son & I added, which will definitely be closed-off in the evenings, as it was our first DIY project, and not “perfect”.) Thank you, in advance, for any responses

I'd move them out now.
Your second project is going to be building a proper sized coop with proper ventilation. These birds need about 4 sq ft of space each in the coop and I can picture what you have in my head as I've seen thousands of them by now.
As long as you've beefed up the latches so that a toddler couldn't open any door and you've got a predator apron around the original "run" (I hate even calling it that as it's not even in the realm of being large enough), you can and should leave the door open. You will likely find that you will need to help them into the coop at night so they will need to learn how to use the ramp.

 

[rosemarythyme]

They can move out now.

Up to you if you want to close the door at night or not. If you feel confident that their run is secure and safe, it's at your discretion.

 

[Chickassan]

Do yourself a solid o.k?
Put some earplugs in before you put them outside because the sad peeps are oh so sad.