Michigan Thread - all are welcome!

[Folly's place]

I'm stewing about whether or not to offer another pullet this year. Already thought that the flock is where it needs to be (except for those cockerels!) but maybe one more could leave anyway.
Check with @Candy442 , she might have birds to go still.
Mary

 

[snowflake]

Hi @aart - I’m looking at your roosting bars in your coop and outside of the nesting boxes. Question....what is the height of your roosts above the PB? Also, it looks like the roosts outside of the nest boxes are 8 inches from the boxes. Is there a proper height or distance that is best?

My girls share the same nest box and the plan is to have a 48”x16”x16”h. I was planning to have 4 boxes with separators available.

the exterior of my coop is constructed and the windows are positioned in a way that one of The roost/PB will be in front of one of the windows. Venting will be open in the rafters so I will have that ventilation plus the windows.

I’m sure I will have more questions as we get closer. Thanks!

Beautiful coop, it is always best to be able to walk in and clean. My roosts are free standing, not attached to the coop, makes it very nice when spring cleaning, I can take them out, wash them with bleach water or power wash them and let them dry in the sun. poop boards underneath roosts, attached or not makes for an easy cleanup on a weekly bases and helps keep the floor a little cleaner.

LOVE your coop, very nice!!! can't wait to see pic's of it when it is finished

welcome JW, this is a good place to be. lots of nice, helpful people

 

[1muttsfan]

@RaZ , I always start getting a little worried when we haven't heard from you for a while

 

[aart]

@RaZ , I always start getting a little worried when we haven't heard from you for a while

Was wondering too, but I got the impression he spends his online time in BYC on FB?

 

[RaZ]

Was wondering too, but I got the impression he spends his online time in BYC on FB?

@RaZ , I always start getting a little worried when we haven't heard from you for a while

I was pretty much off the grid this weekend. A couple of friends came up from down state. Did some drinking and reminiscing with Jim and his wife did some cleaning and organizing for me. They left here Sunday afternoon and I was so sad to see them leave.
They had originally were come up to help with some chores (fire wood) but my log-splitter had a mechanical failure, and I didn't have fuel for the chain saws. But we had a great time catching up. Then we were lucky enough to find the parts I needed for the splitter. So ordered them. It will take a week or so for the parts to come in.

Rather than lament not getting chores done, we had a couple of bonfires and tried to catch up with each other. Their visit was only the second time that that old friends made the trip up here.

My time on FB is rather deceiving. When I log on, I only spend a few minutes on that sight, but I leave the computer turned on for most of the day so it only looks like I am active. Truth is that I don't spend much time there. I'm usually outside doing some chore or another.

 

[RaZ]

Before my downstate friends came up, a nearby neighbor was helping me try to figure out what was wrong with my log-splitter. Here is what we found.

I've been using that machine for more than 15 years so I have no complaint that it failed I should have it back up & running by the weekend.

 

[Sally PB]

We just got a log splitter about a month ago. We've rented one several times, but it is so much nicer to be able to split wood on your own schedule. That thing is a beast; it will probably outlast us and be passed on to someone else when we shuffle off this mortal coil.

 

[aart]

Here is what we found.

Is that a drive coupler?

Glad you had a great weekend!

 

[bigmrg74]

45 years ago today the witch of November took the Edmund Fitzgerald.

The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee
The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
When the skies of November turn gloomy
With a load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more
Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty
That good ship and true was a bone to be chewed
When the gales of November came early

The ship was the pride of the American side
Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin
As the big freighters go, it was bigger than most
With a crew and good captain well seasoned
Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms
When they left fully loaded for Cleveland
And later that night when the ship's bell rang
Could it be the north wind they'd been feelin'?

The wind in the wires made a tattle-tale sound
And a wave broke over the railing
And every man knew, as the captain did too
T'was the witch of November come stealin'
The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait
When the gales of November came slashin'
When afternoon came it was freezin' rain
In the face of a hurricane west wind

When suppertime came, the old cook came on deck sayin'
"Fellas, it's too rough to feed ya"
At seven PM, a main hatchway caved in, he said
"Fellas, it's been good to know ya"
The captain wired in he had water comin' in
And the good ship and crew was in peril
And later that night when his lights went outta sight
Came the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald

Does any one know where the love of God goes
When the waves turn the minutes to hours?
The searchers all say they'd have made Whitefish Bay
If they'd put fifteen more miles behind her
They might have split up or they might have capsized
They may have broke deep and took water
And all that remains is the faces and the names
Of the wives and the sons and the daughters

Lake Huron rolls, Superior sings
In the rooms of her ice-water mansion
Old Michigan steams like a young man's dreams
The islands and bays are for sportsmen
And farther below Lake Ontario
Takes in what Lake Erie can send her
And the iron boats go as the mariners all know
With the gales of November remembered

In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed
In the maritime sailors' cathedral
The church bell chimed 'til it rang twenty-nine times
For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald
The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee
Superior, they said, never gives up her dead
When the gales of November come early

 

[1muttsfan]

I just returned from a hair-raising trip to Missouri - No mask laws there! And they are a red Covid state now, just like us. 2100 miles, 36 hours in the car. Picked up my sister on the way down, and we stopped to do some amateur geology, found oodles of fabulous fossils in a few road cuts. We could hardly get in the car to come back, it was so fascinating.