City - neat egg picture. I anticipate you'll get bigger eggs in the future. Nice color, too. My EEs rarely lay a big egg like the one in your photo. My whoppers come from a RIR hen and a LB hen. They usually take a break after laying the mammoth eggs, so sometimes I won't see another from them for two or three days.
NNBreeder - I want to have the five-gallon buckets outside my pens. I plan to put them on cinder blocks. A plant stand would work, too, as you suggested. Drilling into the bottom of the bucket to install the drinking nipples won't work, since the bucket will be outside the pen. To get the water from the bucket to the chickens, I'm going to drill into the side, near the bottom of the bucket, and then cement in a PVC pipe with drinking nipples installed along its length. Three is the maximum I'm planning. I think there will be enough water pressure for three. I'll take some pictures and tell everyone if this works after I've built and installed the first one. If an arm of PVC pipe doesn't work out, I will definitely drill into the bottoms of the buckets and use a plant stand to hold the buckets at a comfortable drinking height for the chickens.
I took some pictures of the new concrete slabs around our barn. The crew spread the dirt around a bit for me, and they even moved the original side door stoop (concrete pad) into place next to the west and south slabs. I may put a storage shed on that bit of concrete so I can keep rakes, brooms, hoses, etc. close to the barn. I'll try to remember to take pictures as the barn develops.
NNBreeder - I want to have the five-gallon buckets outside my pens. I plan to put them on cinder blocks. A plant stand would work, too, as you suggested. Drilling into the bottom of the bucket to install the drinking nipples won't work, since the bucket will be outside the pen. To get the water from the bucket to the chickens, I'm going to drill into the side, near the bottom of the bucket, and then cement in a PVC pipe with drinking nipples installed along its length. Three is the maximum I'm planning. I think there will be enough water pressure for three. I'll take some pictures and tell everyone if this works after I've built and installed the first one. If an arm of PVC pipe doesn't work out, I will definitely drill into the bottoms of the buckets and use a plant stand to hold the buckets at a comfortable drinking height for the chickens.
I took some pictures of the new concrete slabs around our barn. The crew spread the dirt around a bit for me, and they even moved the original side door stoop (concrete pad) into place next to the west and south slabs. I may put a storage shed on that bit of concrete so I can keep rakes, brooms, hoses, etc. close to the barn. I'll try to remember to take pictures as the barn develops.
