The Plunge

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At least where you are you should have good weather between now and then to get the brooder ready and make sure the coop is finished. Waiting is torture but at the same time if you don't get ready you can be under a lot of stress to finish up.

I don't know if this is your first chicks or not or what your facilities now look like, but that should be an attractive flock and a very nice egg basket. Lots of color and diversity there.
 
Ridgerunner said:
At least where you are you should have good weather between now and then to get the brooder ready and make sure the coop is finished. Waiting is torture but at the same time if you don't get ready you can be under a lot of stress to finish up.

I don't know if this is your first chicks or not or what your facilities now look like, but that should be an attractive flock and a very nice egg basket. Lots of color and diversity there.
Click to expand...

Hi, there. This isn't my first flock, and I learned a lot from my first go-round a few years ago. I did NOT have everything set up and in order when I started brooding my first peeps. While there were only 8 at that time, it still stressed me out to no end getting things up and running.

And as I now am farming full-time (with a day job I work a couple days a week for healthcare and retirement), my approach is much different, too. My first chickens were for my own little homestead and having my own eggs. Now it is very much about the egg basket and being able to add those to the produce I market. I wanted to add Marans to the mix, but trying to coordinate a hatch of that many varieties and the price per chick just made it too prohibitive. I'm really looking forward to this opportunity.

I'm also going with a different brooder setup this time, opting for a Sweeter Heater rather than the bulb setup I used the other times I've brooded babies. The heater already shipped, so I have plenty of time to figure out exactly how I'm going to build the brooder...and where. I could brood a handful inside. But 40...I would like to sleep at some point. :-)
 
Brahma Chicken5000 said:
Congrats on your chicks. Hope the time flies for you. Can you post pictures of the coop and run. I love seeing other people’s setups.
Click to expand...

Sure thing. I'm behind on my picture-taking. But you can follow a lot of what I'm doing on my Instagram account: https://www.instagram.com/corvusfarm/

Here are some quick images. The building is a shed kit from Lowe's that I modified (like leaving open rafters rather than putting in the interior storage loft). These are the only "in-progress" images I have access to here at work.

The coop and run sit within a guava orchard on the farm, and between two garden plots of about 1 acre each. The entire 8-acre property is fenced in, but not high enough to keep coyotes all the way out. The run fencing is deer fencing up to 10-ish feet, with the bottom three feet being 2" x 2" wire mesh. The combination of the property fence and the deer fence means that during the days when I'm on the property and outside working, the chickens and ducks can free-range all 8-acres. But the majority of the time will be spent inside the run for safe keeping, especially once the the crops are coming in.

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