Really, really, really didn't want to take the Babies to the Allotment today. I wanted to keep there here for "just a few more days" so I could get them more used to eating from my hand etc, and so I could look out for them if the weather turns rainy.
Common sense prevailed. They will have a lot more room on the Allotment, and there is lots of greenery for them to eat. So, we started packing the car this morning. One of the Grandpas feeders. Scrubbed and empty drinker. Unopened bag of Growers pellets. Second feeder. Second drinker. Remains of opened back of pellets. At this point, I needed to remove the chicks from their netted area, so we could take the netting down (we need it on the allotment).
So, I caught them one by one and put them in the Saavic Dog Crate. 20 was far too many to travel in that one crate, but it was a convenient place for them to wait until they had all been caught and given a bit of grape as a treat. DH then took the netting down, while I cut holes in a roomy cardboard box and then moved 7 of the chicks into it. And then we were off.
We put them straight in their new shed/coop, with a waterer. We shut them in, hoping to imprint "coop" on them, while we put up the netting, and sorted out the other chooks (more about those in a separate post). Kept checking on the chicks, and they were happilky scratching around in the Aubiose flooring, and drinking.
Put the feeders in place, filled up the waterers, and opened the pop hole to let them out, I took a quick pic before they realised that the pop hole was an entrance to the outside world...
..and another quick one as they started to make their way to it...
They had a whale of a time, munching the grass/weeds, and exploring their new area. We've only given them about a third of the space we've allocated them; firstly, there is a lot of greenery and I don't want them to gorge on it all at once, and secondly, I want them fairly well contained until we're sure they are going back into the shed at night.
The Established Chickens were not amused.
