Fluffy Butt Acres: Stories of our flock

[RoyalChick]

I really like this idea !!!!!- it would still give plenty of airflow, and would only serve to restrict their access to the rafters - which you don't really want them to go there anyways. A large enough Aviary netting to tack up across the entirity of the chicken palace on the underside of the rafters....or, tack it to the wall just under the rafters at that wall...out to the next rafter, then up to the roof - just to keep them out of that particular set of rafters so they can't get into the people/servant quarters.

Just to keep them out of the servant’s quarters is easier to do from inside. It is just the triangle at the top. I can put chicken wire over it.
Netting for the rafters is a big effort. It is 8-9’ up on sloped and uneven ground.
I guess what I have been pondering is why isn’t it OK for them to go up there if they want to? I guess I worry it is a long way down though both Eli and Babs managed to get down OK.
Maybe rafters chickens is OK??

 

[RoyalChick]

Understood. I also like things I can take apart easily enough, you never know!

I can’t think of a design choice rats wouldn’t be able to overcome if it involves dirt / real ground, or even wood they can chew. Even if you permanently closed that area off or built it that way, then you’d be doing demolition to get to it. Could you put HC panels under there that prevents a chicken getting very far in at least?

I think a larger hen needs escape room too, but I agree 10” is too large. I found 6” too narrow for Buckeyes and Orpington shoulders, even as young hens. 8” might be better.

But I thought the idea was to create places they could go that inhibited mounting, not necessarily places a roo can’t fit by himself?

Helpful. I will go measure their little doors between sections they use now.
I was thinking that the supports between the two verticals would be like a vertical ladder providing 2-3 individual-width perching spots. The branches would allow more birds to hang out.

 

[rural mouse]

I am still pondering the cat tree for chickens. I am thinking of anchoring a 4x4 vertically about 6” in front of the big 6x6 that you can see here where Mr. Chips is standing. I have a couple of good length 4x4s in my scrap lumber collection.
Then I could do branches out on either side using 2x4s (have plenty of those too).
There are a few issues one of which is my realization that my flyers will use it as a launching pad to go up to the rafters. And for those I would have to block access into my storage area which is behind that shingle wall. Not impossible but awkward to access.
In the foreground of that picture I can arrange some tree stumps and I can forage in the woods for some good sized branches as well.

View attachment 4244897

Why not simply use the 6x6 already there?

 

[featherhead007]

Just to keep them out of the servant’s quarters is easier to do from inside. It is just the triangle at the top. I can put chicken wire over it.
Netting for the rafters is a big effort. It is 8-9’ up on sloped and uneven ground.
I guess what I have been pondering is why isn’t it OK for them to go up there if they want to? I guess I worry it is a long way down though both Eli and Babs managed to get down OK.
Maybe rafters chickens is OK??

Rafters chickens? You crack me up sometimes.

 

[rural mouse]

The reason not to attach branches to the structural vertical is that they would then only be 6” from the hardware cloth wall and I felt like they would be less likely to fly up to it with less space and certainly would find it hard to get up if they happened to be in the wall side.
One of the issues I am wrestling with is access to that overhang under the shingle wall. It is one of the few areas in the Chicken Palace that is tough for me to get to. One of the few design choices I regret.
I need to be able to get there without too much dismantling.
If a chicken went there to die for example. Or, as actually happened, the rats used it as they access to the cavity under the storage room floor.
With the rats I hung dog panels off that vertical beam so the chickens couldn’t get to the area and that is where I tried trapping and baiting the rats (neither of which worked of course!).
The reason for the 6” was to make a small gap that a small hen/pullet could fit through but a big roo couldn’t. I can make it more but 10” would be big enough for anyone. The supports between the structural vertical and the cat tree vertical would be bits of 2x4 and would be like little perches for little pullets/hens to be safe on.

The smaller hens are typically more agile than the larger roos, so as long as there's something to dodge around, even if he can follow through the space, he's going to be slowed down. Re the 6x6: why not run the short roosts out perpendicular to the hardware cloth? Off set steps going up (maybe a lowish one on one side middle height opposite and high abocw the lowish one, one parallel down low (like 2 feet up), likely just used as a quickie getting away from any irritating bird and as a stepping point to go up.

 

[featherhead007]

I don’t have rafters in my coop. We call them jungle gyms. Plenty of ramps and ladders for the fatter chicks! Mr Wyandottey prefers to have the highest perch (go figure)

 

[rural mouse]

Helpful. I will go measure their little doors between sections they use now.
I was thinking that the supports between the two verticals would be like a vertical ladder providing 2-3 individual-width perching spots. The branches would allow more birds to hang out.

If the tree roosts (wherever they happen to be) are 2-4 feet long (beyond the mounting vertical), 2-6 birds could fit on each one. Rarely will you find them crammed onto one. More likely they'll be all spread out. If the roost is getting mounted to the vertical in the middle, the roost needs to be 4-8 feet long. The longer length definitely should be cross-braced or connected to another support at the other end. In that pic, running at least one roost from the 6x6 to some point on the shingle wall would be a useful thing. Is there a spot in Cookie's corner (where she got stuck) where a roost could go, or does that block human access?

Putting a vertical post somewhere sort of in the middle of the area (nearist the bottom of the blue steps) would allow roosts to branch out in several directions if you decide to connect the other end to other supports along the walls. Or just branches coming off to about 2-3 feet in random directions....they might launch from the top of the steps to the tree (getting a game of Hot Lava going).

 

[drstratton]

Daylight clown car opens....with names

I love how some of them just have to go through the little door too!

 

[drstratton]

Love how they kept going out the small door even though they had the big door opening - too funny! Love it

I said the same...

SHRA

 

[drstratton]

Havent changed the clocks yet, wont until tonight. This way when I get up at Dark-O'Clock I'll get an extra hr. Then when I get home I will just bring the horses in right away.

The chooks wont be happy, they will lose an hr of daylight in the evening to be out and about. I can do without the time change really.

I'd rather have more hours at the end of the day too. It was really hard on hubs before he retired, he went to work in the dark, spent the day down inside the dam and came home in the dark. He'd try to get topside when he could.