Cattle panel coop blew away!

[jcatblum]

I have several cattle panel coops. Storm came in & blew it at least a football field away. I have the
Set up so they are each on 6 wheels & easy enough for me to move on my own. Should I stake them with tent stakes from now on? How do I keep them from blowing away? They have made it through several storms. I am sure the winds were at least 60 mph. Pretty normal for where we live. Any ideas

 

[bryan99705]

How about a picture so we can see how you're set up. The cattle panels I've worked with were heavy as a broken heart!

 

[jcatblum]

Sorry don't have a pic tonight, using my phone. When we lived in town my kids huge wooden swingset even managed to blow over the fence - the kind with fort & the works from SAMs club. Winds are just brutal here! I had never seen anyone saying cattle panel coops need to be anchored so I honestly didn't consider it blowing away & smashing to smitherines!!

 

[bryan99705]

I've got a couple ideas but would like to see the set up

 

[muddyhorse]

you can get anchors for sheds they sell them at home depo buy the metal sheds you put together.

 

[Bear Foot Farm]

Anchors like these would work:

http://www.kaboodle.com/reviews/swing-n-slide-anchor-it-ground-anchors

 

[patandchickens]

Are these extensively tarped? (I am having a little trouble imagining a bare-naked cattle panel hoop coop blowing anywhere at all)

The less tarp you have on them, and the more it's on the UPWIND (in storm-front gusts) side, the less they act as sails. Shadecloth can be substituted; it doesn't provide complete protection vs wind and rain but OTOH it doesn't act as much like a sail either. I mean, obviously you do need to provide the chickens with some shade and shelter, but the less it consists of solid tarps, the better the thing will stay put.

As far as anchoring, you can use the screw-in earth anchors pictured above, or spiral dog-tie-out anchors, or some large cinderblocks, or tentpegs, depending on what you want in terms of the tradeoff between how well the thing is anchored vs how easy it is to move.

Good luck, have fun, hope your chickens were all ok,

Pat

 

[jcatblum]

I do have the tops tarped. One coop didn't move the other blew across the pasture & got smashed up. However I fell better seeing the storms aftermath now that we have daylight. Neighbors boat flipped whole trees ripped out of ground & the works. At least I know that no matter what I did the coop would have blown! I will go ahead & anchor them for some added piece of mine. The coop that blew even had a good size rabbit hutch attached inside (that of course is now in major need of repairs). I also had a large bucket with a cinderblock in it that blew about 100 ft. brick still in the bucket! Haven't heard how fast the winds actually were but hopefully we don't have any more of them soon!

Oh & I did loose 1 chick, my 2 DD helped me gather the others during the middle of golf ball size hail brought them in & put them under heat lamps! It was an adventure that is for sure.

 

[jcatblum]

The local news say it was 90mph straight line winds. So that alone explains why the coop blew away!!!! Thankfully we don't seem to have much other damage on our place.

 

[wyoDreamer]

I'm glad to hear that you were able to save most of your chicks, RIP little one.

That must have been quite the ordeal trying to gather them up.
I'm sorry that you had to go through that. Glad that you don't have too much damage to your place.

Mother nature has sure been throwing some wild parties lately.