Mini-van-coop-fire evacuation-mobile, PREDATOR BREAK IN!

[joan1708]

Your comment made me think I should turn my story into a children's book and perhaps donate most of the profits to our local volunteer fire department. I mentioned the idea to my husband who said "go for it!" but my daughter shouted down from upstairs "But what kind of children's book ends, 'and they lived happily ever after...until we ate them'?" I thought it was a mother's job to take all the fun out of everything, not the other way around!

But yes, you can tell your daughter that the little chickens were amazingly brave and tolerant about the whole thing, and seemed to settle in wherever we put them with minimum drama, while the older chickens were more upset by the changes around them, proving that the young are often more adaptable and strong than we give them credit for.

Now that's FUNNY!

 

[3forfree]

Change affects everyone, they may go back to the original one after they get settled.

 

[Life is Good!]

Your comment made me think I should turn my story into a children's book and perhaps donate most of the profits to our local volunteer fire department. I mentioned the idea to my husband who said "go for it!" but my daughter shouted down from upstairs "But what kind of children's book ends, 'and they lived happily ever after...until we ate them'?" I thought it was a mother's job to take all the fun out of everything, not the other way around!

But yes, you can tell your daughter that the little chickens were amazingly brave and tolerant about the whole thing, and seemed to settle in wherever we put them with minimum drama, while the older chickens were more upset by the changes around them, proving that the young are often more adaptable and strong than we give them credit for.

You should turn this story into a children's book! Your moral is the last line "the young are often more adaptable and strong than we give them credit for". And you can take author's liberty and change the breed if need be.....if author's change the name of the folks involved to "protect the innocent" - well, isn't that what's being done here?! You've certainly gotten enough photographs on here to make a story-board - both photographs and drawings would work well. Go for it! Well, after the dust settles a bit perhaps.....who knows, if you advertise through the same t.v. media that showcased your coop via tv, you might find a willing author to co-write if you're nervous about writing.....

 

[Heat]

Five eggs yesterday, but strangely enough, before this evacuation and relocation they all favored the nesting box on the far right, yesterday all 5 eggs were deposited in the one on the far left, which in almost a year has never had an egg laid in it before. Whatever.

They like to keep you guessing The hens at my moms will favor one box for like 6 months and then they will abandon it and use one in a completely different area... I think they live to keep us guessing sometimes.

Woo hoo for rain! We are finally getting heat up here in Washington so our rain must have made its way down there! I hope it keeps pouring for you!

*Rain dance*

 

[marlo1968]

Your comment made me think I should turn my story into a children's book and perhaps donate most of the profits to our local volunteer fire department. I mentioned the idea to my husband who said "go for it!" but my daughter shouted down from upstairs "But what kind of children's book ends, 'and they lived happily ever after...until we ate them'?" I thought it was a mother's job to take all the fun out of everything, not the other way around!

But yes, you can tell your daughter that the little chickens were amazingly brave and tolerant about the whole thing, and seemed to settle in wherever we put them with minimum drama, while the older chickens were more upset by the changes around them, proving that the young are often more adaptable and strong than we give them credit for.

And maybe that needs to be the moral of the story....the young can overcome and adapt to their changing world even though the older don't seem to believe its possible....also young children can understand food chain, how it works and why. I say go for the children's book, would be great!!

 

[Hummingbird Hollow]

A week ago I would have a very hard time believing I'd be saying, "OK folks, we have all the rain we need for now. Feel free to send your prayers for rain to help with some other fire or drought." 15 minutes on Monday, almost 4 hours on Tuesday, off and on almost all Wednesday - Saturday, with major gully-washers as well as gentle downpours almost all day today. Mud slides and flash flooding happening down hill from where the worst of the Waldo Fire took away the vegetation and I haven't been able to finish the repairs to my chicken tractor so that I can go retrieve the rest of my Freedom Ranger. (tractor was damaged pulling off the mini-van coop in the rushed evacuation ) Still, prefer the rain to what came right before it, so I won't complain, but I'm sure there is another part of the country that could use it more.

 

[joan1708]

send it to Texas!

 

[Hummingbird Hollow]

send it to Texas!

Will do! (will do my best that is)

 

[Hummingbird Hollow]

Mini van/mobile coop is finally back home, after transporting chickens over 170 miles.

I thought I'd have it and the Freedom Rangers home on Sunday, but when we drove to Florissant, we couldn't find the key to the van and had to leave with about a third of the Freedom Rangers in dog crates in the back of the other vehicle.

We got a new key made and drove back today for the rest. I've got 20 of the now 8-week-old Freedom Rangers in the mini-van/tractor setup, two in with layers (may keep them, may not...jury is out) and the other 13 in a somewhat makeshift coop/run that I built in a rush on Saturday in anticipation of having all of them back. It's sort of sloppy looking, because I made it out of a big 4'X4' wooden crate attached to a 4'X2.5' dog crate for an interior space of about 4'X6.5',and every bit of lumber was scrap that I had lying around. But, by their second night in the new digs, all of the Freedom Rangers put themselves to bed and all I had to do was fasten the latch on the dog crate and say goodnight. It has a sloped metal roof that seems to be doing a fine job in keeping the interior dry in all this rain, so I think it will do just fine for the next few weeks and perhaps even do duty again next year...unless my husband stays resolved that "we'll never do this again!"

 

[Hummingbird Hollow]

Hey friends. Remember how pleased I was with myself at this photo:



Well, here's what it looked like this morning.



One mangled Freedom Ranger in the coop and three more missing. So, I guess I wasn't so clever after all. Something broke in that was strong enough to force the metal cover inward, agile enough to climb in but small enough to make it through the opening. My bet is on a raccoon. Having read some of the posts on the "Predators and Pests" thread, I realize that losing 4 out of 20 chickens is probably a lucky break, because they've been known to break in and kill everything and just leave it there. So, major fix is needed before dusk. Before noon would be even better.

Figured I better post this in case someone out there decided to copy my design.

darn it, darn it DARN IT!