Consolidated Kansas

[Katy]

FINALLY we're getting some rain. 1.5" last night and the week before about 1.25 in three little rains. We're still probably 10"+ behind for the year, but it's a start.

 

[LN2008]

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I've started it.. It's coming around slowly, only because I've changed my mind like.... 1,000 times. As for the tin, I have a friend with a truck but I hate to make him drive out Topeka with me! Sometimes I hate having a tiny tiny car.

Then think about this. Today I filled up our vehicle, I put in 38 gallons @3.25 a gallon. The $124 I spent will last me 6 days. I can't have a little car with 4 kids, a wife and myself. The most I have spent at one fill-up is $146. This is one of the biggest reason we are moving back to Topeka, I will cut my fuel bill in half.

haha. Yah got me there.

 

[LN2008]

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I've started it.. It's coming around slowly, only because I've changed my mind like.... 1,000 times. As for the tin, I have a friend with a truck but I hate to make him drive out Topeka with me! Sometimes I hate having a tiny tiny car.

oohhh... pictures!!!! I want to see!! Are you doing a walk in or a raised up coop like mine?? I love seeing progress pictures! You must be a lot further along than I am if you are getting roofing! WOW! I've been working on mine for a month!! You may need to ask your friend to have him drive you at some point... but maybe you'll manage on your own. There would have been no way I'd have gotten the 4X8 ft plywood home or the 8 ft 2X4's without my truck. And ByNatureFarms is right- you have the advantage of great gas mileage with a little car. I have a diesel truck (it is a 1-ton single axle) so it's a big heavy truck and if it had a gas engine- I'd spend a fortune in gas! Diesel engines get really good gas mileage. It's also a stick shift- which does even better! I picked it out for exactly those reasons. I can haul fully loaded with 4 horses and still get right around 18 MPG. My old truck- which was a gas engine and was a dullay (double axle) 1-ton got right around 8 or 10 MPG!! It was baaaaaaad. It was also an automatic transmission, even worse. Anyway- I've got 3 kids, so I drive a minivan with them- not the greatest on gas, but what else could I do.

Sooooooo.... those pictures?????

Is everyone else getting RAIN!?!?! We are! We got rain all night long, too!! WooHOO!!!

I'm doing a raised coop with a run, similar to yours but smaller! haha. I have the platform area built, most of the lumber cut but I just need to put it all together. It won't take me much longer I hope. I'm still thinking about driving to topeka in my little car. I've gotten 6 2x4s 1 4x4 misc supplies in my car all at one time before. It's all about how you tie it in. I even got the hatch closed when I did that!

 

[Hawkeye95]

LN2008- oh, can't wait to see your coop and what you've come up with!

I went to the feed store this morning and bought my first bag of real grown up chicken feed for Seymore. She's been eating chick starter. I bought layer crumbles. They also had layer pellets. Which one do you all like better? It's supposed to have probiotics, and all kinds of things in it for laying hens.

Anyway, I figured the crumbles would be easiest on her to switch from.

Oh! and I have an annoying raccoon that is messing up my barn every night. He's trying to get into my horse grain barrels, but they are too big and heavy for him, I guess. But I did have empty bags of grain out on the floor next to the barrels (trash comes tomorrow....) and every night this week he has been dragging the bags all over the barn. Every morning I go back out and stack them up again. This morning i went out and he had drug a bag down the breeze way almost out the barn door! Do they eat grain? They must if he is so interested in my empty bags?? Which means I've got a raccoon that will go after my turkey, so I'll have to be doubly sure that I build my run VERY secure. Could he climb up onto the coop walls? Or up around the nest box? It's elevated off the ground, seems like that would be a hard thing for him to do.. But I'm going to have wire over the windows anyway. Oh- and will he come out during the day to get my turkey? She's just penned up with chicken wire under my deck for the time being.

 

[Ivywoods]

Hawkeye, yes, raccoons can climb. The one time they got through our pens in Solomon they climbed to the top and found a weak spot in one of the top corners. They are persistent. Also, chicken wire is no match for a raccoon. They will pull and pull and work and work until they get a hole. Welded wire on the outside of the run is a must as far as I'm concerned. Sometimes I will use chicken wire inside my runs to separate pens, but the whole outside has to be welded wire.

Along the outside of the pen, run a foot or so of welded wire around the perimeter. If you pin it down the grass can grow right up through it and you can mow over it. Raccoons and dogs will dig into your pen to get to your birds. They always start right at the edge of the pen, and that is why running the wire down on the ground for about a foot will work.

I generally only have flight netting over the top of my pens, and a raccoon can tear through that... and that is why you need to get out there and trap that raccoon NOW before you get any more poultry. They will tear your chickens apart if they get the chance.

 

[chicken danz]

I have to agree. Get rid of that varmint! I use welded 2X 4 wire on my pens then line that with chicken wire. Keeps the good in and the bad out. I normally leave a few inches of wire down on the ground or below ground to deter digging. I have used metal flashing and dug a trench with my pens that have a bottom board. That works excellent but again that is a little more cost and time. And all of my pens but one is covered. I do have two Great Pyrenees that keep everything away but still I want to know they are all safe.
If you have an owl or a hawk fly in for lunch having the top covered is invaluable.
Raccoons love grain but they love killing birds more. Nip that coon in the bud. It seems when one finds food then they bring back the whole family.

 

[Hawkeye95]

looks like target practice starts early. Okay- so what about my turkey during the day? Is she safe? At night, I put her in the dog kennel in the garage. I would NEVER trust her to be outside in the chicken wire pen under the deck at night. Mostly, we are outside all the time and I am at home. There is no cover from the barn to the house (no trees or shrubs)- so I'm not sure a coon would just blazenly walk up to the deck in the middle of the day? Am I wrong? All of this just started the end of last week. I wasn't sure what was doing all of the mess in the barn (dragging things around) until I saw the poop right in the driveway that goes to the barn. It's like this coon is just re-organizing! I'll have rubber buckets moved where I keep them on one side drug clear to the other. It's so odd.

 

[sharol]

Animal control brought me a trap to get the skunk (who has disappeared completely so far). Maybe you could trap him and then shoot him. It might be easier than watching for him all night.

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[ByN8ureHomstead]

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You could trap them

Daren you might want to try this.

You may caught some other unwanted critters.

 

[Hawkeye95]

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You could trap them

Daren you might want to try this.

You may caught some other unwanted critters.

Wow, that trap freaked me out! But on the up side- there is no trying to shoot them.. it's all done in like 2 seconds! Wow. I'd just be sad if the neighbors cat got in it. Well... maybe. heh