Hello from Kentucky

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Well, my chicks are pullets now...........and still in the brooder in the kitchen! Their coop is just about finished as well as their run, but the weather has me baffled. I know that by next winter they will be equipped to survive the winter without artificial heat in their environment, but thus far they have only been inside the brooder in our kitchen. They're ten weeks old now and are really cramped in there! That and we have to clean the wood chips out of their water and feed dispensers daily and the dish of chick gravel as well as change the bedding. The next two days would be nice to move them out to their coop, but Monday the temperature is going to dip, and Tuesday it will be freezing again! (There goes all my nice spring flowers and the blossoms on my trees that just blossomed for the first time ever!) I thought about putting them out during the day and bringing them back in at night, however as hubby pointed out, we probably couldn't catch them to bring them back in once they get a load of all that SPACE!!! Our BO may cooperate since she's the tamest of them, but the rest would probably run under the coop and we're too old to scoot under there after them. Does anyone have any suggestions?

I've changed my "avatar" to the latest picture of three of them up on the little roost we put in the brooder box. They have to duck down to sit on it. They're getting so tall!
 
Hubby got the run done, and it was nice and warm today (80) so we took them out and let then loose in it. We carried the brooder out and took it into the run. We had to take them out of it one at a time. At first they stood there in a tight little group. A bird flew over and they looked scared. We went and got dandelion and put it in a pile by them. They started to peck at it and mill around a bit. Then we gave them some dried meal worms and they threw all caution to the wind! LOL!!! Soon they were flapping their wings, scurrying around, and began scratching and picking. As soon as we get some sand, I'm going to fill up a bin with the ingredients for a dust bath. Hubby is working on the automatic pop door as fast as he can. I painted the last of the items to go into the coop today and they should be put in tomorrow. The only trouble is, Tuesday it may snow! They're not used to that kind of low temperatures yet so I hesitate to put them out there until I'm sure the night temperatures won't go below about 45 or 50. We put them on their chicken ladder up to the pop door just to see what they would do. It seems a bit slippery between "rungs," so none of them came all the way down without flying off to the side. I bet they'll use it to get up to their door, though. I put a colorful fake chicken that I call my "funky chicken" in the pop door opening and they didn't seem to be afraid of it. It's actually for decoration outside of the coop and run. Our barred rock, Fernie, hopped off the ladder/ramp and ran over to daddy, climbed his leg to his lap (he was sitting on the ground), up his arm to his shoulder, then pooped. LOL!!! Then she ascended to his hat! She seems to take to him. Buffy is my girl. The two cuckoo marans seem terribly skittish yet in that they don't want either of us to touch them. They were late comers, about three weeks later than the other two, but I hope seeing the other two being more friendly will put them at ease eventually.

Hubby thinks the one marans, Daisy, might not be a female because the tail feathers are longer. I found several feathers in the brooder, though, and I think they might be from the smallest one of the group, which is the other marans. That would explain why one marans tail feathers are longer than the other one. They are all ten weeks old and there is no red nor even pink on any combs and no sign of waddles. I hope I don't have to give any of them up!
 

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