- Jun 21, 2012
- 34
- 9
- 32
Hi, RockyRose here, I am new at this and have already perused a lot of this site even before getting my first chicks or even building our coop and run.
My first 4 chicks were 6 week old Speckled Sussex, what appears to be 3 hens and one roo which I purchased on May 30th. I got another 4 hens on June 9th, these were 17 weeks old when I got them and they are RIR bred with White Rocks. Nervous at first about putting the big chicks in with the little ones but they are ok. The older ones are bossy but so far no real problems. The Sussex are catching up in size very quickly.
Both sets of chicks are from local Massachusetts farms.
We built a coop inside the back of our barn and attached a run - not the prettiest as we used a lot of recycled materials in the construction, but it's functional.
Will be allowing them to free range as both breeds were raised that way, I am just still nervous about runaways and need to add some very basic fencing in a couple of spots. I guess experience will help too! They have been out of the run a couple of times in the past week, near dusk, in hopes they'd go back to the coop as it got dark. Didn't quite work out as I had planned but no disasters, just a bit of running around catching chickens!
This promises to be quite the adventure....between enlarging my gardens this year and getting chickens I am starting to feel like a farmer. Never would have thought I'd start this at 50 years old!
Hope to meet some new friends here and looking forward to participating in the forums...
RockyRose
My first 4 chicks were 6 week old Speckled Sussex, what appears to be 3 hens and one roo which I purchased on May 30th. I got another 4 hens on June 9th, these were 17 weeks old when I got them and they are RIR bred with White Rocks. Nervous at first about putting the big chicks in with the little ones but they are ok. The older ones are bossy but so far no real problems. The Sussex are catching up in size very quickly.
Both sets of chicks are from local Massachusetts farms.
We built a coop inside the back of our barn and attached a run - not the prettiest as we used a lot of recycled materials in the construction, but it's functional.
Will be allowing them to free range as both breeds were raised that way, I am just still nervous about runaways and need to add some very basic fencing in a couple of spots. I guess experience will help too! They have been out of the run a couple of times in the past week, near dusk, in hopes they'd go back to the coop as it got dark. Didn't quite work out as I had planned but no disasters, just a bit of running around catching chickens!
This promises to be quite the adventure....between enlarging my gardens this year and getting chickens I am starting to feel like a farmer. Never would have thought I'd start this at 50 years old!
Hope to meet some new friends here and looking forward to participating in the forums...
RockyRose
from Ohio. So glad to have you aboard. 
