Maine

[Jazor]

.... I hate the amount of feed they seem to be able to waste when using dry feed. If anyone has recommendations about how to minimize waste when using dry, please let me know. The girls are currently using crumbles. ....

I'll have to snap a few better photos, but I made a hanging feeder that seems to keep them from spilling/wasting much of their feed. I mostly load it with crumbles, but I'll add in grains/grits/etc. for them as well just to mix it up.



In the photo you can see the two hanging systems I've got in the coop--water on the right and feed to the left. It's a 2 gal. pail I have used a hole-saw to cut half a dozen (but more would be fine) holes in the lower portion of the walls. Then I cut the very bottom few inches off a 5 gal. pail and joined the two with a simple nut/washer/bolt combo. Using the handle of the pail, I hung it "chicken height" with some chain to the rafters in the barn. Extremely cheap and easy system, and there are dozens of people in these forums with more clever ideas--but this one cost next to nothing and even the time investment was minuscule.

It's easy to peel the lid off the white (2gal) pail and dump feed in, as they eat more, it trickles out through the holes and keeps doing so until it's so low in the pail that it cannot gravity feed. With my 20 birds it lasts quite a few days.

 

[lazy gardener]

Looks like a winner. I have a lot of Folgers plastic cans. All I have to do is find a base that will be appropriately sized. ? is 4" difference in diameter between base and top a good amount?

 

[anyasmifya]

Wow, Jazor your chicken house, is coming along very nicely. Your hanging feeders are great. I also have mine hanging like that but I bought mine. Yours are very clever and functional. What is the room in front of the coop area going to be? Storage is my guess. I also love your metal garbage cans! I had a set of three, one I was using for an actual garbage can by the road and some jerks stole it! We have some stupid petty thieves around here. Our wheelbarrow was stolen a number of years ago. Our neighbors just had there brand new garbage can stolen too! I hate thieves!

In response to chickens wasting dry feed. I have hanging feeders and mine do not waste much. Our biggest issue is a red squirrel and a chipmunk eating it! I'm sure those squirrels have a 50lb bag stockpile for the winter. lol

Alas, still no eggs... I know the rir is going to lay soon. I miss my fresh eggs!!!! I loved making recipes just to use up eggs, like meringue, pastry cream, angel food cook, quiche, etc...

 

[Jazor]

Wow, Jazor your chicken house, is coming along very nicely. Your hanging feeders are great. I also have mine hanging like that but I bought mine. Yours are very clever and functional. What is the room in front of the coop area going to be? Storage is my guess. I also love your metal garbage cans! I had a set of three, one I was using for an actual garbage can by the road and some jerks stole it! We have some stupid petty thieves around here. Our wheelbarrow was stolen a number of years ago. Our neighbors just had there brand new garbage can stolen too! I hate thieves!

Thanks! The coop/house is certainly functional for us. Sorry to hear about the thieving, sounds like a slight increase in OPSEC is in order

The room in front of the coop is storage for now--shavings, hay bales, and feed--oh do I have feed! I've got the metal cans full of the feed that I've mixed (corn both cracked and whole, soft white wheat, DE, hulled barley, oat groats, sunflower seeds, peanuts, split yellow peas, wheat bran, lentils, quinoa, sesame seeds, and kelp powder) as well as some layer pellets and multi-flock crumbles. Chicken feast!

Eventually, that area will house some Nigerian dwarf goats and perhaps rabbits and ducks as well. I certainly want ducks, and may even house them with the chickens, we'll see how that pans out--but that is the idea for now!

Looks like a winner. I have a lot of Folgers plastic cans. All I have to do is find a base that will be appropriately sized. ? is 4" difference in diameter between base and top a good amount?

Sorry, I don't know if I am understanding what you mean there--but my idea with my custom feeder system was to make the area where the food is exposed as small as possible to keep them from being able to thrash it around. If you were looking down at the feeder from above you would essentially see concentric circles. The base sticks out maybe 2" from the inner white pail so there isn't a lot of surface area there, if this makes sense. So the "bottom" of the feeder system (made of the bottom of a 5gal pail) is maybe 3" tall. Deep enough for them to peck down into, but not wide enough for them to make too much trouble.

Like I said, some better photos will probably make this easier. It's incredibly simple in design, just hard to explain I guess!

 

[Widget]

Currently I have five garbage cans on my front porch. All are 30 gal with three being metal and two plastic. None are used for garbage. All are for food storage. One for the goats, one for the birds and the rest for the horses. I have a couple more metal cans that are rusted through on the bottom that I would also be using if I could. For garbage I use all the feed bags I get. They are much sturdier than regular garbage bags. Thank goodness my town does not make us use specific bags that you pay an arm and a leg for at the store. I pay enough in taxes as it is so curb side garbage pick up should be included.

 

[CoopChick719]

My husband and I have (finally after agonizing for a long time!) decided to try and have a baby

we are both very happy and excited about this. Our philosophy is that pregnancy and childbirth are normal and natural. I am a healthy person, under 35 and I do not *expect* any particular problems though I know they can occur no matter what. We would love to have the baby at home with a midwife. I was born at home and so was my brother. We were fine. The rates of unnecessary medical intervention (c section, Episiotomy etc) are much lower at home and the support from a midwife/doula is (imo) much better than the often rushed and impersonal care at a hospital.

Of course we have not told anyone we are trying to conceive hence my vent in here.
Thanks for listening!

MT, I hope you can find a way to do what you want at home! Stick to your guns to get what you want! I always said if I had had a 3rd child, I would have done everything my way regardless of what "they" wanted!
Congrats on your decision to have a new

Seeeee still chicken related!

 

[yankeehill]

Bucka, I you could still plant some winter rye. http://www.uvm.edu/vtvegandberry/factsheets/winterrye.html

MustardTiger, Regarding the cost of homebirth, you may want to call the hospitals and request how much a normal vaginal delivery is for a 2 day stay. Generally this is how long the doctors like to keep new moms in the hospital. Then figure out how much your insurance will cover of that.

 

[MustardTiger]

Oh my insurance will cover almost all of a hospital birth. I simply do not want one. I also really wouldnt want to stay in the hospital for two whole days! It really is a choice about how much I want to sacrifice in other areas in order to have the home birth I want.

Thanks all for letting me hijack the thread for a minute

back to chickens: we processed a few cockerels the other day...we decided to part them out and skinned them instead of plucking. SO much faster and cleaner.

 

[buckabucka]

Thank you for the link about winter rye, yankeehill.

And congratulations on your recent decision and quest for home birth, mustard tiger.

Jazor, your coop looks like a chicken palace. Very nice.

Here's the trough style feeder DH made:

The pipe on top has a piece of threaded rod inside and will spin (making it so a chicken cannot roost on there). If you look closely you can see a little slot in the end. The slot holds a little piece of wood that creates a lip over the feed, making it harder for them to fling it around.
Here's the gang digging around early this morning (sorry for grainy IPad photo):

 

[lazy gardener]

I love your coop Bucka!!!