Have they learned to go back into the coop at night by themselves yet?
Yes they have, what we do every day, is open the back of the coop up, Sue blocks them from jumping out in panic, as I grab them and put them underneath in the small run.
It started off that I had to try really hard to catch them, but now only a couple of them are hard to catch, with the hardest being Korma. The rest seem to wait for me to pick them up, they just squat down and I grab them. I give them a cuddle before walking them around to the lower outside run door, I wont try to force them down the ladder. Korma is always the last one out, but now, as soon as the rest or underneath, she goes down the ladder on her own.
Once down, I block the coop off until late on, so that they can get used to being in the run where there is digging in soil and debris to be had. Once I reopen the coop, after I have cleaned the 6 inches of crap out of it, they all go up and down the ladder from coop to run.
When it starts to get darker, they seem to get really active, running from one side of the run to the other, and the ones that have gone up to the coop, do the same. Korma is amazing, if she is in the coop and there are others that have forgot how to get up the ladder into the coop, she comes back down, gets fussing around them, and goes back up the ladder while the others watch, then they all line up and go up the ladder to bed.
Yesterday afternoon I had opened the coop door and Korma had gone up, I had opened the little pen door for them for the first time yesterday and they loved it. Anyway, I had cleared out some veg boarders and the greenhouse and I went into the pen and dumped a wheelbarrow full of cuttings into the middle. Korma was watching from a window in the coop, and her eyes nearly popped out of her head when she saw what I had done. She ran down the ladder without her feet touching it, and dove head first into the pile of veg cuttings.
I have now decided to keep all their food in the run instead of the coop, to keep the coop clean mostly, but to encourage them to play out. I will keep water in the coop and water in the run and pen. And I will keep a bucket of grit in the pen too. It is still dark this morning, and I am hoping that when it is light, I will see them down in the run, but this hasn't happened yet. Fingers crossed.
Oh, no eggs yet. I have put 2 real eggs in one of the nest to show them what to do.My wife was looking in the nest boxes a couple of days ago while I was out cutting some wood, and I heard her laughing. She said she could see 2 eggs and was just about to shout me, until she saw the sellby date on them.
