- Aug 10, 2014
- 11
- 0
- 22
OK, I joined. I am a 58 yo man from the greater Portland area That has always wanted to chicken farm.
My wife and I bought 4 chicks about 20 weeks ago, 2 red sex links and 2 because my daughter thought they were pretty. My wife was told they were lakenweldiers later. We lost one red very soon, my grandson got it and she didn't survive. The other red started laying a week and a half ago, the second day we got 2 eggs! We are trying to get the coop finished up. Since we rent, we have had to design and redesign a structure that could be disassembled and reassembled on a new site without too much trouble. It has 4x4 corner post and is aprox 6 x 4 and about 2 feet off the ground. The corner posts are on concrete piers to avoid decay and rot. The end walls are each made as one 4 ft wide self contained unit, and 2x3's to connect them in fence brackets and screwed in rather than nailed. Then a floor over them with joist at about 3 foot spacing. We then prefab'd the 6 ft side walls and screwed them to the floor and corner posts. the nesting boxes are in and being used as we fee range them. we are now working on the roof and a design to make it easily removable for when we have to move it. When we get that done we will side the walls, but I am going to get some Blackjack #57 first and seal the floor. I'm not sure if I want to go up the sides or not.
The funniest part of all this is that my wife will not eat the eggs, and my son won't either, he said "are you kidding? I saw where that came from, I ain't eating it.". on the other hand my 5 yo granddaughter checks every hour for eggs and loves to eat them.
I will try to get some pics of work in progress and post them.
Dan
My wife and I bought 4 chicks about 20 weeks ago, 2 red sex links and 2 because my daughter thought they were pretty. My wife was told they were lakenweldiers later. We lost one red very soon, my grandson got it and she didn't survive. The other red started laying a week and a half ago, the second day we got 2 eggs! We are trying to get the coop finished up. Since we rent, we have had to design and redesign a structure that could be disassembled and reassembled on a new site without too much trouble. It has 4x4 corner post and is aprox 6 x 4 and about 2 feet off the ground. The corner posts are on concrete piers to avoid decay and rot. The end walls are each made as one 4 ft wide self contained unit, and 2x3's to connect them in fence brackets and screwed in rather than nailed. Then a floor over them with joist at about 3 foot spacing. We then prefab'd the 6 ft side walls and screwed them to the floor and corner posts. the nesting boxes are in and being used as we fee range them. we are now working on the roof and a design to make it easily removable for when we have to move it. When we get that done we will side the walls, but I am going to get some Blackjack #57 first and seal the floor. I'm not sure if I want to go up the sides or not.
The funniest part of all this is that my wife will not eat the eggs, and my son won't either, he said "are you kidding? I saw where that came from, I ain't eating it.". on the other hand my 5 yo granddaughter checks every hour for eggs and loves to eat them.
I will try to get some pics of work in progress and post them.
Dan
and Welcome To BYC! Congratulations on those first eggs! Bet everybody else will start wanting to eat them after they see how much nicer they are than store bought!
They are such treasures!
