Looking to have chickens back on property.

[Hainies Hen House]

Good to hear that you are back on track and feeling great!

Will look forward to updates at Hainies Hen House -- but that hawk needs to find a new home!

Thanks Calender Girl and everyone.

I feel blessed to have hawks, bald eagles and osprey in the area. Growing up while DDT was still in use it was rare to see any birds of prey let alone a bald eagle.
I have material to cover the top of my runs. The hawk is welcome to all the mice, squirels and chippies which are abundant here.
We are a couple hundred yards from the Schuylkill River. I just hope the recently returned river otters never pay a visit.

 

[swampfox440]

Hi, welcome back nice to meet you.

 

[Grammy60]

Hello and welcome back to BYC

 

[Boppo]

Glad to meet you - I wasn't here when you originally joined. I am so glad you are feeling better, and excited to hear you are nearing chickens. that is a big hawk. I am glad you have that attitude about hawks, but hope you have no plans to free range your chickens! They would be sitting uh, chickens.

 

[Boppo]

I am lucky to have a family of crows that has nested in a neighbor's trees for years, and they are extremely careful to chase off hawks, foxes, or other predators that they deem dangerous to their family. They stay on alert year round, as far as I can tell. Several years ago, one red fox actually caught one of the crows, and they have never forgotten it, and they follow any fox that tries to move into the neighborhood and spoil all its hunting.

The downside: it means my yard is overrun with cute bunnies who have eaten all my lettuce, spinach, kale, and are now starting on my flowering sage plants! It has been a very dry year and I guess they are looking for plants that are still green.

The upside, my chickens have the benefit of those very alert crows! I guess I can pay ...

 

[Hainies Hen House]

HAINIES HEN HOUSE HAS HENS!

Well this summer it finally happened. I finally have chickens. A friend of ours incubated a half dozen eggs for us. From those six eggs only two chicks made it to a week old when they were given to us. We purchased four more one week old chicks from TSC.

In our summer kitchen I set up a radiant brood heater inside pallet collars two sets high, roughly 16" tall. I set up another pair of pallet collars on the grass for use when the day warmed up. For a cover I used a garden sieve and scrap piece of ply wood that I moved with the birds between inside and outside. I relocated the outdoor set everyday.

After a few weeks of manually moving the birds twice a day and several escapes a friend of ours gave us a VERY small coop with run that worked much better, but made it harder for me to get hold of the chicks.

I told my neighbor about our chicks. By shear coincidence his girlfriend had to re home her four adult hens due to a chicken ordnance in her town. The hens came with two small 3 to 4 bird size kit style coops.

The smaller of these two has a clam shell opening style roof making it easy to access birds. This is were I now keep the chicks. Im going to add wheels to this coop very soon.

For now, I put the adult hens in the other of the two coops at night for security reasons. During the day they go in an 8×10 dog.

I still haven't gotten my first coop rebuilt, thats in the near future. It was given to me a few years ago. It is approximately 3'×6' and but up to the dog run when after rebuilding.

I still have four cattle panels and assorted materials to build a hoop house style coop in the not too distant future. I'm mulling around the idea of incorporating that with my bokashi windrow I have working out back, but that’s a topic for a future post

I'm trying to teach a hen to pitch a baseball but all she does is "Balk balk balk".

 

[Callender Girl]

But, seriously, congrats on finally getting your chickens! Sounds like you have plenty going on -- and, with chickens, you always will have!

 

[TwoCrows]

HAINIES HEN HOUSE HAS HENS!

Well this summer it finally happened. I finally have chickens. A friend of ours incubated a half dozen eggs for us. From those six eggs only two chicks made it to a week old when they were given to us. We purchased four more one week old chicks from TSC.

In our summer kitchen I set up a radiant brood heater inside pallet collars two sets high, roughly 16" tall. I set up another pair of pallet collars on the grass for use when the day warmed up. For a cover I used a garden sieve and scrap piece of ply wood that I moved with the birds between inside and outside. I relocated the outdoor set everyday.

After a few weeks of manually moving the birds twice a day and several escapes a friend of ours gave us a VERY small coop with run that worked much better, but made it harder for me to get hold of the chicks.

I told my neighbor about our chicks. By shear coincidence his girlfriend had to re home her four adult hens due to a chicken ordnance in her town. The hens came with two small 3 to 4 bird size kit style coops.

The smaller of these two has a clam shell opening style roof making it easy to access birds. This is were I now keep the chicks. Im going to add wheels to this coop very soon.

For now, I put the adult hens in the other of the two coops at night for security reasons. During the day they go in an 8×10 dog.

I still haven't gotten my first coop rebuilt, thats in the near future. It was given to me a few years ago. It is approximately 3'×6' and but up to the dog run when after rebuilding.

I still have four cattle panels and assorted materials to build a hoop house style coop in the not too distant future. I'm mulling around the idea of incorporating that with my bokashi windrow I have working out back, but that’s a topic for a future post

I'm trying to teach a hen to pitch a baseball but all she does is "Balk balk balk".

Congrats on finally getting some chickens! Good luck with getting things set up. I am sure your birds will bring you great joy.