The Chicks Are Coming!!!

I pick them up tomorrow. Eeeeeee! 

I have to stop at a feed store to get a red 250 watt heat lamp (buying the reflector for $12 off craigslist), some chick starter feed, pine shavings and food and water dispensers. 

The first few days they'll be on paper towels on top of newspaper (with just newspaper they can slip and get something called spraddle leg). For the first week the temperature should be 32 C (90 F), but apparently you can tell if the temperature is right pretty easily by how the chicks are behaving - huddled together under the lamp, they're too cold. Huddled as far away from the lamp as possible, they're too hot. 

I made a brooder out of the bottom half of a vari kennel. I zap strapped the door into place and then zap strapped cardboard on the inside of that to stop shavings from flying out. The top is a sheet of hardware cloth. I didn't want to cut it in case we use it for something else later so I just folded it over the edges of the kennel. I think the heat lamp will be fine sitting on top but if that's too warm I'll clamp it onto something else. 

On a less exciting note (still exciting for me - I sit and look at the seedlings alll the time), here are the replanted kale, broccoli and arugula seedlings! Ready to go straight into the greenhouse.