our coop & run in North Texas

[electrycmonk]

So, it'll be a few days before I can offload the pics and shrink them for uploading to this thread.

We got our 1st batch of chicks early April of this year. We had several nasty storms roll right down i-35 and hammer us with 50+70mph winds almost every Sunday for about 5 weeks? So during that time my plans got redrawn a few times. Especially after the neighbors carport was uprooted and rolled - barely missing their propane tank & truck.


So it took me about 5 months to get where it is now. Almost finished have some ends to tidy up still..... Some will wait for a dry spell some for a warm stretch. (Smirks) "hey it's NTX, we'll likely see another 70°day followed by a few 20-40° high days right after it. It's happened before, it'll happen again."

 

[sourland]

Eagerly waiting on the pictures.

 

[BigTexChick]

Can’t wait to see it!

 

[electrycmonk]

2nd attempt to try a test post with a couple pictures from beginning that I just tried to shrink their size.

As I don't know what the size per picture limit is yet here (fingers crossed)

This 1st is the planned site 2.0 on higher & more level ground.

This hill our neighborhood is on was deposited by the glaciers eons ago and with it a massive layer of this formidable stone! It's anywhere from an inch or so to about 18" below surface. Some of the stone I had removed were every bit 100-400+lbs. The biggest ones would get rolled via fulkrum point technically.
The next 3 are pics are versions 4.0 or 5.0- I don't recall exactly.

This last is the skeleton of the coop in the driveway. It was thee best flat & shaded work space! The GN flatbed trailer (in the right corner of pic) was the surface where I created the jig's for initial assembly of the frames & staged them to be brought to the the driveway & the kiddos helped with this part.

Let's see what happens now....

 

[Kiki]

Don't worry about resizing the pictures...you can upload pretty large ones on here.
The bigger the better.

 

[electrycmonk]

Okie dokie smokey. You see every other forum I have been or currently a member of had a size limit for bandwidth limitations for the benefit of those with slower speeds connections. /I can really date myself with a reference to baud rates and the GreatLakesFreeNet circa 92-96 back in Cereal city USA. So I have always been respectful of that for those who deal with modems still or even like we are on DSL with a mind-numbing speed of ~2.5-3.8MB/s given our distance to the nose and living I 3rd tier Telecom area.

Here's a couple more.....
Breaking ground, preping for the cinder blocks & a slab prep shot....

 

[electrycmonk]

So here is the foundation poured.... It then had a few more mods and then there was the frustrating surprise of warpage in the planks....
That warpage and request for adding ideas meant revisions.....



My Better-half took pics of the coops skeleton transfer to the backyard and as such I will have to get then from her phone in the coming weeks.... But, here is it on its foundation -- after the moved, obviously. And the framing mod's for the roof over the run as well as the fun digging holes for the posts.

This last shot. IIRC at least 2 of those stones were in excess of 200lbs each.

 

[electrycmonk]

You know, I could make a seperate thread just on the weathers' effect & affect upon this coops evolution and me as well..... Well, after the a surprise storm materialized about 30-45 minutes after I left to get a few things - WX forecast was a whopping 10-20% chance for T-storms..... I'm at Habitat for humanity looking at the upcycling stuff as the wind picked up and I caught sight of some seriously dark clouds directly north of the store..... Looked at radar.... To late to race home & hope for the best. You see this became the 2nd storm to develop super fast and roll across the county and give a sizable delay for the coop again. Even though I still used the tie down ratchet straps to keep things snug..... Didn't hold up to the 40+ mph gusts. That window was the lucky score from habitat a few days earlier for replacing the windows the previous storm totaled in the driveway the previous week. (Facepalm)

So a good week goes by (I think) before I got to the point where we could start putting the galvalume panels up.....

 

[electrycmonk]

Thatld be about mid August when those panels went up.
So we did a test of the fencing to give the chicks a partial day outside.... The plan was to setup 1/2 the run for them to start acclimating to the 100+ heat AND more importantly, ... outside. Well, I'm working on the coop while a small batch of both groups of chicks are test mingling in the run when I hear a bunch of quick flaps and a chortle. Turn around to see "Fat boy/girl" or her twin had jump/flew up to the top of this temp fence section at the 4x4 post and looked at me! (Cue the classic Charlie Brown phrase,"Oh good grief.")
So I go get the kiddos (carrying the chick inside w/me to be safe). Put him/her back in the crate and the kiddos come help get the rest and put them all back in their crates.....
And no, the dog wasn't laying there with the chicks at the time. Saydie-Brin was supervisor when this pic was taken a day or so later.

Our dogs will sit and watch the chicks and often they will nose up to the fence and a hen will go up and peck at their nose. It's funny to watch.
The tape measure pic is another minor delay... Seems a few of the machine cloth rolls were noticably shorter then advertised.
So here is a few days /week or so later from the South east corner.


And that outta do it for tonight's successful uploads. /Pleasantly surprised

 

[ThreeOfSeven]

Wow, that's quite a construction project! I'm impressed!