Conversion of "3 sides totally open" aviary to a "good for chickens" coop.

[aart]

I got really lucky when I started DL with a buddy who had a dozen loads of chips dumped 6 months before I went and picked them up in a large trailer. Tried to get more this year, his were rotted too far to be of use here and the trimmers who were going to bring a load here blew sunshine all summer and never delivered, did get a small load from someone who's trimmers came thru this spring but only one load so limited amount for me.

Saved some leaves one year, used old fed bags, worked pretty good because they are really really dry. Following year they were as dry as I thought and even in stored in a dry shed, they molded.

 

[paneubert]

Following year they were as dry as I thought and even in stored in a dry shed, they molded.

Stop making me worry! Haha. After my round of collection today, I have a metric ton of leaves. Not literally, but it feels like it. Bagged all of todays and am planning to try to store them until Spring. I am planning to stick them in the quail aviary over winter, which mostly stays dry due to my roof panels. Thinking of putting a tarp over the bags as another measure to keep them dry. I am hoping the fact that they are in paper bags might help a little with not keeping moisture in. If the humidity drops due to the cold weather, should work, right? Hahaha. Maybe Spring will show me a bunch of half composted leaves and some mice nests. Well....no mice since my aviary is secure from those with half inch hardware cloth. Fort Knox for my winter leaf storage needs. Haha..

This isn't even all of them. This picture was taken before I added about 5 more bags. I think I have around 15 in there now?

 

[aart]

Stop making me worry! Haha.

Sorry, I'm on the 'risk assessment' team, not the 'cheerleading' team.

Paper bags with tarp may indeed help... as will the HC.

 

[paneubert]

Not sure how I would deal with that guy..... I guess try to pull him back out the way he came.

 

[paneubert]

What else is new? "Sawed" my finger with one of these.... Right thru my glove.

Right on the knuckle of my index finger. Fun times. Lots of blood, but no stitches.

Before that ended my work yesterday, I lined the rest of my fence with rocks, and also built a threshold for the gate. Can't tell from the photos, but what I did was basically dig out the "high" side so that it somewhat was at the level of the low side, then placed some large flat rocks down into the holes so that they angled up to the level of the gate and run. Then topped and filled in the cracks with 3/8 inch gravel. Sloped the gravel so that there is a nice angle for a wheelbarrow. Plan to add another wheelbarrow or so of gravel on top to ensure it is deep enough to not just dissipate into the yard.
The slope into the grass is pretty gradual, so I am not worried about gravity carrying it away. Still have about 2 cubic yards of gravel in the driveway that I need to put to use, so anywhere I see that I can dump gravel, I do.

 

[paneubert]

Figure I should update this thread, even if just to remind myself of what I did when.

Couple weeks ago I beefed up the framing for the door/gate so it would not sag. Also unscrewed the hinges and raised the entire gate up about an inch. Did this because there is a giant root that is right up against the 4 by 4 post where the gate closes. It is actually perfectly positioned to act as a stopper to keep the gate from swinging inward, but also runs about an eighth of an inch below where I had the framing, causing any tiny rock or stick to jam the door so that it would not close or open easily. Raising the entire thing meant I had to add more bricks/pavers/gravel to close the gap on the lower end, but it was no big deal.

Decided that I wanted to frame in the "fan" of gravel you see in my last photo with some pavers to keep the gravel somewhat contained. Going to leave one paver missing from right in the center of the fan so that I can still easily run a wheelbarrow in and out. Also means I will be able to make the gravel deeper by a few inches without worrying that the "pile" would just slowly fan out into my yard. Some spillage will be expected from the missing paver, but should be minimal. And will create a nice slope hopefully.

Got a free solid wood bed-frame from someone on Facebook. Plan to make my roosting area, poop board, and probably nestboxes out of it. As often happens, it is hard to see how large or beefy something is when just looking at a photo. That was the case here. The bedframe is made from solid chunks of 2 by 8 and 2 by 10 lumber, with the slats that hold the mattress made from 2 by 6's. All held together by large nuts and bolts. All treated with some sort of dark wood stain. Weighs a ton......

It is yet to be seen if it will fit normally in my coop, or if I will need to slice out a few inches from the middle of it, mending afterwards to make it whole again. Hoping I don't need to do that. Going to be close...

My initial thought is to loft the frame a few feet higher, then use the mattress level for poop board. The side rails would have a natural lip to contain any poop board fillers that I add. Sand, Sweet PDZ, shavings, etc... Mount some roost bars from the top of the headboard to the footboard. Maybe two roost bars parallel to each other. Then construct nest boxes under it. Not married to the idea since that would make for some very "deep" nestboxes. A hassle to access unless I loft this really high and possibly loft the nests as well. Think of it like a triple deck. Top for roosting, middle for nesting, then maybe 2 feet that is open air above the floor of the coop.

My main concern with lofting this is that the higher I go, the longer the chicken ladder/ramp I will need to provide for access to the roosts. Don't want it to have an extreme angle, so need to keep the ramp fairly long. My coop will be wider than deep, and this will be going on the wide back wall. Not a lot of room "in front" of the bed for a ramp. I am toying with the idea of putting the ramp UNDER the bed running from head to foot (or foot to head), coming up sideways and entering the poop/roost zone from below. Does that makes sense to anyone? Like the coops you see that have a trapdoor in the floor for access to the run, but in this case the trapdoor is in the floor of the poop tray, already within the coop. Risk chickens roosting right above it and pooping all over the ramp though.....

 

[paneubert]

Guess if I go with this plan, I don't HAVE to make the nest boxes full depth. Roosting area and poop board could overhang the front of the nest boxes as much as I need/want them to. But that just exacerbates the access issue for me collecting eggs. Unless they are up high where I am not forced to stoop/lean in, etc.. I am only 5 foot 4, so I can make it work. Haha.

 

[aart]

even if just to remind myself of what I did when.

I'd take that bed frame apart and use the lumber to build to a plan,
instead of trying to modify it to work.

 

[paneubert]

I'd take that bed frame apart and use the lumber to build to a plan,
instead of trying to modify it to work.

It may come to that since I think it might be slightly long to fit where I want it to fit. Not to mention "deeper" that I need as well. If it fries my brain when I actually go to do it, all the parts will be busted apart for scraps.

But I think it really could work well with the current frame/nuts/bolts if I managed to just trim out some of the length as well as width! Even just 6 inches from each dimension. Imagine those horribly painful surgeries where they lengthen your leg bones. Like that but in reverse. Haha. Just circular saw out a couple inches of wood and then mend it back with some mending plate.

Right now it is sized to fit a twin XL mattress. So the frame is roughly 41 inches by 82 inches. I have it all taken apart and stored for winter, but come Spring I will need to pull it all out and decide what to do with it! At the very least the lumber is nice and large..... Many possibilities. Even just the mattress support slats could be the start of lots of chicken related projects.

 

[paneubert]

In my quest to use up the gravel pile sitting in my driveway, I made a gravel path from the concrete pad at the bottom of my deck stairs to the chicken gate. Also used some surplus pavers to keep the gravel in place. Missing paver in the middle is meant for a wheelbarrow ramp.

You can see that I have still not installed a cross brace for the gate, but that is coming as soon as I get some appropriately sized pressure treated lumber. I installed some additional corner bracing and that actually stopped any sag. Probably since I now have corner bracing on the "face" of the gate, as well as "inside" the four corners. The only tiny sag I a seeing is from the actual hinges themselves....which I cant correct unless I went with a different style hinge completely.

My next plan is to make a rough gravel path from the exterior fence gate to the chicken gate. In the photos above, you can see the open gate in the distance behind the wheelbarrow. Doing this just as an attempt to keep somewhat of a less muddy path for the future. Have pavers to edge it and the gravel pile in the driveway which magically never seems to diminish when I take from it.... I know the chickens are going to scratch around in the gravel and poop all over, but why not give it a shot? Probably will only make it 2 feet wide or so. Just wide enough to easily wheelbarrow on.