[Feeb]

here is the chicken house we have been working on, from start to now - i lost some of the pictures of the inside of the house so i will take them tomorrow

















I will put up pictures tomorrow of the whole frame, plus the inside of the shed and the new nest boxes   Tomorrow we will be ready to put the rest of the netting on which is just great

[lina]

Well done Feeb - although it looks like a slightly one-sided distribution of labour! One gets to take photos whilst the other one works?

How many chooks are you planning to get?

Lx

[Feeb]

probably 5/6

yeah Liam does most of the work as he is a joiner by trade, but i do help - i spent all day digging weeds out of the new veggie garden and turning the soil

Cant wait for the chooks to get here, they can help out and eat the slugs!

[joyfull]

Hi Feeb and Liam, how big is the run going to be and will they have access to the rest of your garden - the motorbike will make a nice perch for them (just remember to wipe the seat before you use it) 

[Feeb]

they will have supervised access to the rest of the garden  probably for a couple of hours a day to peck about and eat the slugs!  they have an enormous run though, we are going to have a lovely brekkie now and then i will take some more photos of the structure

and the inside of their little house of course

[Feeb]

the hen nests!



the whole run structure



Liam attaching the wire mesh to the top   isnt he clever!

[joyfull]

lucky he didn't fall  . Is part of the run going to be covered as well to protect the hens against the rain and also stop the ground ending up like a mud bath? Joyxx

[Feeb]

Hiya Joy, the whole of the run will be covered by see-through plastic - which is one of the very few things we have bought new!  we had some Tarp but i thought it would be a bit bleak under there without a see-through cover

so we bought the see-through plastic and the netting, a bolt for the chicken shed and a lock for the run and that was it

everything else is recycled

[joyfull]

Sounds good to me then, and as you are into recycling when your girls start to lay don't forget to wash then bake their egg shells. Crush the baked shells and give them back to your girls as added calcium to help them make more egg shells - that has got to be the ultimate in recycling  Joy xx

[GrannieAnnie]

You will have to be careful of the see through plastic in the summer though Feeb, you may get roast chickens!!   

also, just noticed the roof.  Is that corrugated stuff tin?  That will get too hot too in the summer, and watch the holes where the corrugated is, handy for mice and rats to climb in.

I'm not picking holes, but just want you to have happy chooks!!

[Feeb]

its not corregated, its just wire mesh!  i will take into account the hot chicken thing and possibly leave some of the run uncovered

but its winter now isnt it... i think they will be alright for a while

[joyfull]

I think Grannie meant the roof on the coup being corrugated tin 

[GrannieAnnie]

Oh yes I did mean the roof of the chicken coop, sorry!!!   

[Feeb]

Nope its all mesh

we have decided to plastic up the roof at the back, leaving the rest of the top and the sides as nice ventaliation for them

[GrannieAnnie]

the coop is the chicken house Feeb, that's what I'm talking about, not the run!