Arizona Chickens

[rockmissjess]

I like b. and c. in the first diagram. I've seen a few cases of failure in the Predators section of the forum from folks using the a. method. The middle picture looks great, I'm not sure how effective the last one would be, I suppose it would depend on the height of the fence.

MY fence is a lil over 5 feet high.. to add on those extensions would give me an advantage.. at least on the side of my house where there is a field off to the side and on the backside of the house

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

Thanks for so for the advice regarding the wall. Going to home depot today to wander the aisles and see what I come up with it!

Need some more advice. I've got an irrigation guy coming to deal with my garden and put a hose and valves and stuff in that half of the yard. He's willing to rig up whatever I need for an automatic watering system for the chickens, I just need to buy the parts and tell him what I want.

Soooo, what do I want? I have six chickens. Do I get the hose that comes down into a cup or the nipple thingy? What do you guys have and love? Gallo? Mary? Bueller?

Thank you!

I have nipple waterers and I like them, but I think cups would be good too. I've always wanted to try them just so I have a comparison to the nipples. The nipples can be a bit tricky to teach to older birds (although many people report that theirs took right to them--my original birds didn't). All of my chicks since the original birds were raised from day 1 on nipple waterers which makes it super easy and the chicks can't ever drown. Both of these work off of very low water pressure so you'll need a reservoir to hold the water. Something like a food cooler or water cooler would work well but a five gallon bucket will also work. A float valve like you see in evaporative coolers or one from a toilet will keep the water in the reservoir constantly full if you plumb it into your house water system. I like this method because you can put a frozen gallon jug of water in it on the hottest days. If you go with nipples, spend the money on good ones (which is really not that much more than the cheap ones). The knock-offs from China are a real hit-and-miss for quality and you can end up with leaking problems. These push-in style or screw-in style from QC Supply are excellent, I believe they are the original Ziggity brand. There are also the intriguing horizontal nipples that have recently appeared thanks to another BYC member, but I have no idea about their quality or performance. You'll need either a bulkhead or uniseal to send the pipes to and from the reservoir. I prefer the uniseal for the cost and failure-proof service but they only work with containers with a wall that is less than 1/2" thick. The great thing about them is they work really well with curved surfaces (like a five gallon bucket) where bulkheads do not.

 

[City farm]

IN YAVAPAI COUNTY HERE LOOKIN FOR NEW CHICKEN LOVER FRIENDS! ANYONE HAVE COYOTE ISSUES???? I HAVE ALOT OF COYOTES AROUND HERE AND I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW HOW TO KEEP THEM AWAY FROM MY HOME. 

Glad to have you on board,

Don't have coyotes here in Tempe where we live, but I have heard we have grey foxes... They can jump up to 6-8 feet..
We have hawks to worry about. We just put up the bird netting along the whole run.. When the chickens free range, we
are out there and our 2 dogs.. Gallo has shown photos of how they kept their flock safe.. Under ground wire ect...

 

[City farm]

Look what appeared in the nest box today! Our first day with all 4 girls laying was Saturday. We had 2 normal small eggs on Sunday, then this! I wonder if it is a double yolker? Quite the shiver to get the rest of it out at the end! This was not staged! Exactly how I found them!

That is so eggciting... Love the photos..

 

[City farm]

My sister lives in Rio Verde less than two miles from the Verde River.  They have coyotes, bobcats, and raccoons to worry about.  She made her coop out of a 12 foot chain link dog run covered in hardware cloth.  The west end is semi enclosed and has the nest boxes. The roof is covered in corrugated metal supported by steel pipe.  Hog panels are used on the ground extending around the perimeter and buried a couple of inches so nothing can burrow in.  Plastic lattice helps create a visual barrier so the chickens feel safer and the predators don't think they can eventually get to them plus it lets in cooling breezes while giving some shade and sun.  The coons can open just about any gate or door latch so the door is locked with a pad lock.  So far nothing has gotten in except scorpions and mice and those get eaten by the chickens.  She uses a similar set up for her dwarf nigerian goats and hasn't lost any either.  Her neighbor lost several chickens because his chickens had several places they could put their heads through their coop to the outside and they got their heads eaten off by coyotes.  The coop needs to be set up so the chickens cannot put their head through the coop walls or doors.  If there are coyotes in the area free range birds are lunch, dinner or breakfast.  Loose dogs in her neighborhood also get eaten.  

Yeah, great set up!!... I did forget about this set up.. Our friends in A.J., That we gave the aloha hens to have 5 acres.. So tons of wild life.. They did
loose some hens due to the chain link fence openings.. They were sucked, pulled out by the cyotoes...

 

[SunBaked]

I posted myself about finding her on Craigslist but I will check with animal control tomorrow. Thank you for the advice! She's not very afraid of me so I know she's been handled, and well cared for. I put her in with my chickens.. Is that okay? I know nothing about peafowl!

Chickens can pass blackhead to peafowl but since it is so hot and dry here I haven't heard of blackhead being a big problem. As long as your chickens have never had any trouble with it she should be fine. She will adopt them as her flock. Good thing she found a safe place with you before anything happened to her. The peafowl forum here has some great information and an awesome group of people. There is a sticky at the top with all the best links.

 

[rockmissjess]

Yeah, great set up!!... I did forget about this set up.. Our friends in A.J., That we gave the aloha hens to have 5 acres.. So tons of wild life.. They did
loose some hens due to the chain link fence openings.. They were sucked, pulled out by the cyotoes...

yeah we have some openings too which is why i need to buy hardware cloth... i have two fence gates in the front and a double door one on the side (to the field) so i need to make sure i get those covered up for sure.

 

[MandyFitch]

So I was worried that the nipple waterers wouldn't be hydrating enough in the summer. They might prefer cups to get bigger gulps of water?

What do you think of this one? It will be hooked to a hose that will be put in specifically for this. They'd still have the hanging waterer of back up, too. I'm going to be gone for six weeks this summer and I'm trying to make it so that whomever I find to chicken sit will have as easy a time of it as possible.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/290619075617

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

So I was worried that the nipple waterers wouldn't be hydrating enough in the summer. They might prefer cups to get bigger gulps of water?

What do you think of this one? It will be hooked to a hose that will be put in specifically for this. They'd still have the hanging waterer of back up, too. I'm going to be gone for six weeks this summer and I'm trying to make it so that whomever I find to chicken sit will have as easy a time of it as possible.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/290619075617

That looks good and would obviate the need for a reservoir. Usually pressure reducers are much more expensive than that whole set up so I'd be interested to see if it works. I would think about having a backup too, maybe a cup mounted in a five-gallon bucket. With so few birds your sitter might only have to change the water once or so. All it takes is the water to be disrupted for one day and you could lose all your birds if you don't have a secondary water source.

FWIW, I too worried about the amount of water my birds were drinking from the nipples and I measured it. Every time they found a pool of water, they gulped like they were deprived. I was so looking for a reason to ditch the nipples but I found they were drinking slightly more from the nipples than a standard vacuum waterer. Weird but true.

 

[MandyFitch]

That looks good and would obviate the need for a reservoir. Usually pressure reducers are much more expensive than that whole set up so I'd be interested to see if it works. I would think about having a backup too, maybe a cup mounted in a five-gallon bucket. With so few birds your sitter might only have to change the water once or so. All it takes is the water to be disrupted for one day and you could lose all your birds if you don't have a secondary water source.

FWIW, I too worried about the amount of water my birds were drinking from the nipples and I measured it. Every time they found a pool of water, they gulped like they were deprived. I was so looking for a reason to ditch the nipples but I found they were drinking slightly more from the nipples than a standard vacuum waterer. Weird but true.

Seems anti intuitive, doesn't it. There will definitely be a second and probably third source of water all summer long. Plus shade cloth.

Gallo, you told me your whole family climbs, right? What are your favorite places to climb outdoors in /around Phoenix (I realize this is not your turf.) Awful what happened to SS's husband. My worst nightmare. The funny thing is that I used to be a hardcore skydiver and now I'm all paranoid but I think it came with having a child. C'est la ve!