This is Jason looking very annoyed.
That's Camden on the left, Jason in the middle cleaning up and Chelsea - on the right - taking the chickens out of the cage (she had been caring for the flock while my husband was in the hospital) and introducing them to their new home.
Chelsea is telling Whoopie.... "this is a roost"... poor Whoopie was killed a month or so later by our dog Little Man. She died in my arms. I miss her.
Chelsea is showing Aunt Jemima the roost now. Poor AJ... she was carried off by a hawk or eagle... I miss you too...
This was the FIRST nesting boxes... the girls didn't like them
so I changed them to....
which they seem to like and are easy to clean. Even though I've never been able to get them level... I'm still working on that.
I started with a hay floor... that didn't work out well... poop + hay = gross mess... SO I had this great idea! River rock.... so I picked up all the river rock (pail by pail) from the back yard and put it in the coop. I cleaned it every day and it stayed damp... which helped with our flock coming down with gape worms (my poor babies!)... so now I'm using pine shavings (I like this... it's called the deep liter method and it's working well for us).
My Husband is on the mend and we've been working on upgrading our summer coop into a four season coop because it's starting to get a little nip in the air and we have to make sure our little flock will be warm this winter. It's not going as easy as I thought it would. Seriously. I thought no problem... throw up plywood... take the roost down that are WAY to high and put new lower ones in... stay tuned for the upgrading of
The Red Roost Inn
I LOVE the name you chose!! And can't wait to see the finished coop. It's so exciting.
ReplyDeleteYou'll want to be able to tend to the coop with regular cleanings and, of course you want access to the eggs. You should ensure that you have a way to get into the coop. The door for entrance should swing into the coop, not outwards.Build A Chicken Coop
ReplyDeleteIn the tropics I noticed a 1m elevated chicken coop with slats/weedmat/sawdust - the breeze under the coop seemed to keep the sawdust dry and the hens in healthy production. I will be trying this system over the next few months.
ReplyDelete