Finished the New Chicken House! Thoughts and Ramblings on Things That Need Input...

[pennyJo1960]

mine is metal never gets so hot okay so I live where it is livable

 

[ColtHandorf]

Brought them home last night. He’s taken a strong interest in breeding the last few days apparently so I see a saddle in our future. For the moment they are content to wander a bit, stand, sleep, eat, and hide in their house. I’ve been outside all day keeping an eye on them.

 

[pennyJo1960]

looking very happy like how you did it all looks safe good job

 

[ColtHandorf]

All went well over the weekend. I brought them home Friday night and put them to bed. We got about three inches of rain between 7:30 AM to 9:00, so their previously dry pen was a bit of a swamp. Thankfully about two thirds of the pen is on a small rise so there wasn't any standing water (except a random hole about ten inches across directly in front of the door to their house... *deep sigh*). The little fatties discovered their food in the hanging feeder first and chowed down before wandering out into their yard and clucking over the green grass and handful of grain and legumes I'd sprinkled about to get them to explore.

He bred her several times which is promising. I did a fertility check on one of the last eggs she laid at my friend's house and to my untrained eye it looked fertile. Within a few hours they discovered their water. Mostly they spent the day lounging out of the absurd wind around the side of their house, or in the house eating. They put themselves to bed for the first time on their own the first night.

Second day was a repeat of the first day. He noticed a crow flying over when I was out checking on them and gave a little alarm call. The hen was already in the house eating so I've no idea what her response was. I was pleasantly surprised that he even noticed honestly. In my head I'd mostly thought of them as fat, pretty, not the thriftiest/flightiest of breeds. So I was pleasantly surprised. She has not laid an egg yet, but I'm not too worried about that. She has two milk crates filled with hay to choose from. The ground is so wet I'm hoping that she lays there versus in the mud.

 

[Nardo]

@Nardo I meant to ask you the process you used when mounting the netting over your runs? The pen should be about 25' x 50' give or take. There are some 8-ish ft poles in the barn that I can use to create a peak so I don't have to walk hunched over. The wire is only five ft tall and I'm just over six...lol Did you use zip ties or wires to attach it to the fence? Do you support it? I'm also going to have cut it in order to get it around the tree on one side. How would you recommend closing the cut in the fabric and attaching it to the tree well? The netting is mostly to prevent hawk attacks, but I'd like it as secure as I can get it.

Yes, yes and yes. I did have to cut and go around a tree in one spot. I used zip ties to connect and used poles from cut down trees to make a peak. I also used PVC to make a frame where the span was too wide like some of these: https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/using-pvc-for-a-hoop-house.488361/
I have about 20 feet X 25 feet under a HUGE tree with no limbs low enough to help with tying the netting so the hoop is cheap and being here doesn't have to bear any weight excepting the mesh. But it collects leaves and twigs that (1) make it sag and (2) further disguise the hens from hawks .

 

[ColtHandorf]

"If your poodles are fairly chicken friendly it could be a very happy partnership. I’ve also met standard bred poodles better trained as guard dogs than most of the breeds that jump to peoples minds at that description. They are one of the smartest breeds out there, and no laughing matter when the get defensive!"

@Kris5902 - lol Chicken friendly? Let me paint a picture of the first day shall I? There should be plenty of mud to use. So it poured, three inches in about an hour to an hour and a half. Immensely frustrating after the yard had almost dried out with like four to five days of little to no rain. I had to wait until 10:30 or so to quite literally wade out there to let them out. I let the dogs out into the yard so they could go to the bathroom and splashed my way to the chicken pen to let the Orpingtons out. The dogs were mildly interested in watching me, but were having more fun running at high speeds through the wet grass and puddles (poodles) or finding a spot with shorter grass to not be completely soaked (dachshunds).

The hen figured out the whole ramp/ladder situation relatively quickly and made a beeline for the feeder inside the house, thus avoiding detection by the chicken police (dogs). The rooster after several minutes of half-hearted and pathetic attempts to get down the roost pole to the ramp was rescued by me and placed on the ground where he could join her at the feeder as he was very interested in what sort of goodies she'd found. After a few minutes he wandered out and my female white/cream party poodle Anastasia (Anna) saw him for the first time. She completely lost it. Barking frantically, literally bouncing up and down the fence through the largest stretch of mud and water slinging it everywhere. This of course drew the attention of Romanoff, my male black/white tuxedo party poodle and Evelynn (Eevee) and Maribelle (the two dappled miniature dachshunds; one red and one silver). Everyone came charging across the yard at full speed. The little ones at least had the decency to stand in grass and bark at full volume. While Romanoff and Anna both barked, bounced, splashed, jumped over each other and on the fence and I screamed at both of them to stop and behave, the rooster looked on completely unimpressed and unafraid...lol

I should probably mention at this point none of them have ever seen a chicken. Romanoff is much better behaved than his sister (actually a cousin). Anna however has a ridiculously high prey drive and came to live with me when she took a very expensive, hand-fed Rupell's parrot off my friends hand when she burst through the dog door and broke it's neck. The dachshunds have no prey drive to speak of. They like bothering cats and Maribelle used to bring me baby chinchillas when they escaped through the bars on their cage until they were too large to squeeze through the one inch bar spacing.

The hen at this point intrigued by the ridiculous amount of noise wanders out of the house and sets them into further acrobatics and vocalizations. I'm still in the chicken yard on the other side of the fence calmly asking them to (screaming really) to stop it and go somewhere.

The chickens completely ignored the dogs. My friend has two English bulldogs (Fluffy and Goober McFatkins, respectively), another standard poodle (Natasha), a chihuahua (Lu C Fur), a Great Pyranese (Spooky), and a pig (Penelope). So they are used to silly yard antics and have plenty of space to wander in another direction from my idiots.

I'm now brandishing a stick from my side of the fence and screeching while my roommate laughs from the back porch. My old ladies are now bored. The chickens aren't running, won't get within sniffing distance, and are clearly not cats, so they wander off. Romanoff is also done. He's a bit of a princess, so splashing around in mud really isn't his thing. He usually minces around the yard in a floating trot and is ready to go back inside. Anna the barbarian though, literally has black mud dripping from her as she continues to act like a complete heathen. I stomp/splash my way out of the chicken pen and back into the back yard proper. I then proceed to stand on the fence between her and the chickens and make her remain calm, dripping mud and all. Bored with my lessons on how to be a lady she wanders off. Except every time I turn around to check on the chickens or she thinks she's out of my line of sight she makes a bee line for the fence again. Of course I can hear her splashing a mile away. Stealth is not her forte. So for the next thirty minutes I guard the birds until she's completely bored with them.

Each time I took them out I had to go through the process all over again with her. The next day it was less frantic but I was also over the amount of filth she was getting in to so for the time being all the dogs have been relegated to the smaller yard that came with the house before I expanded it just to keep the mud down. I still need to mop the floors (I swept last night and mopped the dining room) and then do the mud room and shampoo their couch in their room. I'm hoping she didn't forget everything once the yard has dried out enough to let them go run in the big one. She watched them from the little yard with interest but not so much that she's clearing the four foot fence or popping the gate open. So there's that to be grateful for I suppose...lol

@Nardo - Thank you. I haven't covered their yard yet, moving was not a friend to my bank account, lol but I'll be getting it after the next pay day and putting it up. hopefully it looks more professional than I think it will...lol

 

[Nardo]

@Nardo - Thank you. I haven't covered their yard yet, moving was not a friend to my bank account, lol but I'll be getting it after the next pay day and putting it up. hopefully it looks more professional than I think it will...lol[/QUOTE]

Oh no worries, mine doesn't look professional. It looks like a chicken run with mesh over it. Shrug. No one can see it from the house or the street so who cares? My hens are safe.

PS

 

[pennyJo1960]

Yup there is not so expensive net on Amazon 50 x 50 I have
https://www.amazon.com/Baikalo-Netting-Poultry-Aviary-Square/dp/
that one is 30 they have one that is 50 x 100 for 60 use anything and everything to hold it up planting of saplings also works

 

[ColtHandorf]

"PS "

I am glad you thought so...lol I could have just cried when I saw my floors after they came inside... They are all due for baths again also...lol

 

[pennyJo1960]

Buy a kids flat nose or snow shovel and a putty knife works get to scoop crap from the floor that and white shavings