The old coop doesn't look too bad.... A quick repair might be able to get it to last a little longer.I know with the Church, it was when I fell through the floor that that coop was done. It took a lot of repairs over the years, and that last winter finished it. There was no more repairing it. It had to be burned. We wasn't able to save much from it, except for the cross, door, and maybe a couple boards.
Yep! Happy to help!
GOSPEL!!!I had 5 chickenless years after retiring my in-town flock because I was working long hours at a highly physical job and was too tired to take care of chickens as well as my family. Then my life changed and I got chickens again.
That said, consider @Lacy Duckwing's point about whether you're investing a lot of extra effort into your birds that isn't really necessary.
For example, you might be scooping poop daily. I know that the sand-and-scoop people talk about how it "only takes 5 minutes" but I know that for me it's stressful and annoying to have a list of those "only takes 5 minutes" chores hanging over my head every single day no matter how I feel or what else I have to do.
In the article I wrote on Deep Bedding, I calculated first that I couldn't possibly get tools, scoop, add the manure to my compost pile, and put tools away in less than 10 minutes -- which adds up to 70 minutes a week, 4.5 hours per month. But with Deep Bedding in my coop I can schedule 1 hour of work every 6-12 weeks in good weather on a day off.
Deep Litter in the run likewise takes only a little work to add new material once every month or 6 weeks (maybe less often depending on the material), and can be cleaned out once a year in favorable circumstances.
You might be using a labor-intensive feeding regimen such as fermented feed, wet feed, or measured and scheduled feedings. Life is much less stressful if you fill a good-quality hanging feeder with all-flock pellets or crumble once or twice a week (according to the size of the feeder and the number of chickens you have).
Likewise, if you're using open waterers and have the labor of cleaning and refilling them daily -- or even multiple times a day -- you could switch to large waterers with horizontal nipples (I'm currently in the process of replacing my smaller waterers with larger ones to eliminate filling the small waterers as a daily chore).
If you showed us photos of your setup and talked to us about your daily routine we might find ways to reduce the stress of the daily chores.
This would be best answered on it's own thread. When you make that thread be sure to tag me since I'm in NC too.
I completely understand your reservations about using CL. You can also find great homes that way. It is how I found my ducks. I go above and beyond what most poultry pet owners provide for their animals and my ducks even get yearly wellness exams and expensive surgery if they need it.
I meant get another shed (off Craig's list for cheap) and replace all the coops with it. Not turf out your dad's mower for the chickens
I meant get another shed (off Craig's list for cheap) and replace all the coops with it. Not turf out your dad's mower for the chickens
Then look at carefully integrating the flocks into one. It will save you so much work and time in the long run. I have a mixed flock of 20, with a gazillion different breeds, from 4 weeks to 3 years old currently.
