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+1. When a rooster becomes human-aggressive, I figure it's his way of saying, "I have a strong desire to swim in a pot, with onions, garlic, herbs and whichever vegetables are in season."

That's the crux of traditional agriculture! One machine that cleans chicken poop, shells corn, shovels cow manure... modern technology pales in comparison.

I have to admit... I find butchering excess/mean roosters easy, but I always find an excuse to keep old hens around. Mind you, I consider their bug-eating, compost-turning activities to be the main point anyway, but still, sooner or later, I'm gonna have to boil me some hens.

Pretty much any organic material is great. I mostly use pine shavings, grass clippings, and leaves in the covered runs, and all of that plus garden waste, tree bark, pine needles, and even small logs in the uncovered runs. It all rots down into a sort of duff like the natural forest floor...

It would be about six weeks, maybe two months before I had to start being creative. I keep a few hundred pounds of corn and small grains on hand, as well as fish meal and a vitamin/mineral supplement. After a while, I'd have to thin the flock, but they have pretty good forage here.

I've generally been happier with purchases from local feed stores than with TSC, but local feed stores can vary a lot. (so do individual TSC stores!) As far as the feed -- if they're milling it themselves, it's almost certainly fresher than the Dumor. I see this as a big plus -- grains start...

I (usually) get my first cup of coffee, then the chickens get released&fed, then eventually I get breakfast.

Hmmm... I've read a lot of your posts, and I'm pretty sure you're not insane. ;) I wish you hadn't deleted your post. FWIW, I've seen a few posts that did strike me as childish blather from a possibly insane person, but it seemed better to let it go that make a rude comment. As far as...

Why, exactly, should that alarm everyone? I'm not sure I follow your logic here. If a company produces a defoliant, does that make all their other products dangerous?

Look on the bright side -- that's great for drainage!

Kinda figured that with Florida. ;) Another tip is to have lots of cheap doormats at the foot of the porch steps, at the top, and anywhere else. ;) Just in case you make a quick trip inside and forget to unshoe.

If you don't have ants or deep mud, crocs do the job. If you do, rubber boots. I have both, and choose according to the situation. They don't come in the house either way, ;) In the winter, I wear a leather Wellington by Muck Boots. They come inside the laundry room door to warm up and dry out.

Do you know how deep the foundation is? I'd probably lay hardware cloth or chickenwire around the walls to discourage digging predators. As donrae said you may want to add some ventilation, but overall, i'm thinking you're pretty lucky. ;)

In a hot climate (I'm in South MS), I'm a huge fan of having the coop under a tree. My main coop is under a big oak. Hot summers are rough on most breeds of chickens. Also, personally, I like the coop fairly close to the house. I don't want to have to walk a mile to care for them, and I want...

There may be a slight crack in the base, or the jar isn't fitting tightly to the base. Is it a "real" canning jar, or something else? Sometimes the threads vary a little on mayo jars and things like that.

I start giving mine greens at about 3 weeks, after offering grit as mentioned. I like the put a kale or collard leaf in the brooder and watch them figure it out. ;)

+1. At this point, they've come to associate the coop with safety and security, which will make managing them a lot easier. Definitely a good thing.

The last time I needed to compare, Wayfair had the best prices: http://www.wayfair.com/Mat-Mesh-Hardware-Cloth-308B-BFJ1001.html I went ahead and bought a roll each of 24" and 36", because I knew I'd be building multiple chicken houses before it was all over. Buying 15 foot rolls at Lowe's...

I'm kind of embarrassed that I didn't realize that that was what you meant. ;)

I use a variation of this spreadsheet: http://www.backyardpoultrymag.com/2-3/harvey_ussery1/ It's pretty easy to plug in values and tweak the recipe as needed.