Wednesday, October 1, 2014

At home with the Buckeyes

I'm happy to report that the Buckeyes finally settled into the new chicken tractor.  By placing their food and water inside the tractor, encouraged them to go inside it to explore.  Once they had determined that it was a safe place, it only took a few more days before they started spending the night there.
Sidebar: the chicks had been taught to go to bed at the words: 'Bed-bye'.  In the beginning it didn't occur to me that 'Bed-bye' to the chicks would mean for them to go to bed in their chick house.  They made this association clear to me the first night when all were in bed in the big house except one.  I said, 'Bed-bye' and they all came flooding out of the house to stand by the chick house door, waiting for me to open it up.  Sorry, kids.  My bad.
A day or two after that, after tucking them in for the night in the tractor, we moved the chick house out to repurpose it for other things.
I'm now wondering how long is it going to take before they start using their roost at night.  Currently, when they go to bed, they nest up together like they did when they were chicks: in a tight chicken nest in a corner of the house.  All in good time, I guess.

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