Built my own Chicken Crate

Pics
Date sort Score sort
SouthofEden said:
Hahaha! Yes true! I love watching my chickens.:love
I went in search of Mexican Flame Vine but the nursery talked me into Pandorea vine and some other vine with purple flowers on it. Not passion flower, because I know what that is, this vine grows rapidly and will quickly fill in the side of the coop. So hopefully by next summer, it will be well shaded. Thanks for the advice!
Click to expand...
Well if you can ever source the mexican flame vine it is a great one to send up a palm trees trunk just don't allow it to reach the canopy it is a good nectar plant for butterflies. We are just now getting over an Army worm invasion and my little flock just loved those non toxic caterpillars. Had I known they would eaten all of my bermuda and johnsongrass I could have saved myself 5 hours of mowing. Anyhow, that is what got me thinking about the passion flower line. Since naturally quite a few cat's would fall into the pen and provide some extra stimulation for your flock.
 
AllenK@new2this said:
Well if you can ever source the mexican flame vine it is a great one to send up a palm trees trunk just don't allow it to reach the canopy it is a good nectar plant for butterflies. We are just now getting over an Army worm invasion and my little flock just loved those non toxic caterpillars. Had I known they would eaten all of my bermuda and johnsongrass I could have saved myself 5 hours of mowing. Anyhow, that is what got me thinking about the passion flower line. Since naturally quite a few cat's would fall into the pen and provide some extra stimulation for your flock.
Click to expand...

Oh My! We had a similar epidemic. Didn't know the chickens would eat them. I researched and purchased a non-toxic bacteria spray to kill them. They were ruining a yellow trumpet vine I had. Yikes! I could have just moved the pen over and the let the chicks have at it.
 
Well the chicken know what they can eat but i prefer free bug protein when possible. Definately, worth planting for bugs as your gals would probably love it. I will ASSUME if the plant is toxic as is milkweed for Monarch/queen/soldier butterflies then the larvae are too, and take that assumption to nontoxic-nontoxic. Since mine were eating grass non toxic bermuda I ended up with 100,000+ non toxic caterpllars. It truly was as someone described my photo's like a scene from Hitchcock's "The Birds".
 
AllenK@new2this said:
Well the chicken know what they can eat but i prefer free bug protein when possible. Definately, worth planting for bugs as your gals would probably love it. I will ASSUME if the plant is toxic as is milkweed for Monarch/queen/soldier butterflies then the larvae are too, and take that assumption to nontoxic-nontoxic. Since mine were eating grass non toxic bermuda I ended up with 100,000+ non toxic caterpllars. It truly was as someone described my photo's like a scene from Hitchcock's "The Birds".
Click to expand...
I'd like to see THAT photo!:eek:
 
SouthofEden said:
Oh My! We had a similar epidemic. Didn't know the chickens would eat them. I researched and purchased a non-toxic bacteria spray to kill them. They were ruining a yellow trumpet vine I had. Yikes! I could have just moved the pen over and the let the chicks have at it.
Click to expand...
Every caterpillar species I have encountered naturally curl up and drop as a defense mechanism when either their host plant is shaken or hit with a good blast of water. I offer that advice should you in the future want to collect them in large numbers for your flock.
 
SouthofEden said:
I'd like to see THAT photo!:eek:
Click to expand...
Here you are a photo not all of them were within the focal plane so you will see lots of floaty looking dark spots where there are more taken on an ancient Cannon 20D with a 24-105L lens at 24mm: @SouthofEden sorry I was so slow to see your request.
IMG_3019.JPG
 
Last edited:
AllenK@new2this said:
Every caterpillar species I have encountered naturally curl up and drop as a defense mechanism when either their host plant is shaken or hit with a good blast of water. I offer that advice should you in the future want to collect them in large numbers for your flock.
Click to expand...
I had no idea! I will definitely do that next time. The girls can use all the protein they can get and its free! :)
 

Similar threads

Browniebird
    • Like
Milk crates
Replies
2
Views
544
WingItRanch
WingItRanch

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom