Show me your quail pens!!!

[gardenisto]

Got free roofing material from the neighbor... 10 years old, covered in years of hoarding, mud and mule deer poo. Cleaned up, cut to size. Also installed a plexiglass skylight(12" wide by 18" tall), which should be fun to look into. You wouldn't be able to tell the roof is recycled material at all. Need to create a ridge cap from the same roofing material, caulk... then finish paneling, insulation, plumbing, window trim, feeders, and then get it onto the rolling base with a water reservoir.

Yay, freecycling. Starting to look a little like a doll house.

Unintentional, but my gf is pretty excited about that.

 

[gardenisto]

All the nipple feeders are installed, non leaking, and running. External plumbing needs to be enclosed in hardlines and insulated. The reservoir needs to be dressed up, and inusulated. Bottom bay needs door latch and window protector needs to be removed. Sealer, Paint, or Stain. Thats the next big question. But all is well on the top floor for a a bunch of happy hens. Some minor electrical work to be done to clean everything up to 1 main power line. Each bay has been water proofed with a bed liner material, and pine shavings absorb moisture of droppings, so far it seems is easy enough to clean, and birds don't need to be on wire. It also smells like pine, not droppings and ammonia. Wooh!

 

[paneubert]

Last year I posted about how I wanted to make a quail coop up against the side of an existing shed. After thinking that over for a bit, I came to the conclusion that an "Under the Deck" arrangement might work out better. Already has the benefit of solid framing and a solid (at least when it comes to keeping predators out) roof. There is power available on the deck above, and if I wanted to be crazy then I could actually divert a downspout that runs under the deck to fill a natural looking pool for drinking water or something. Not as a primary source of water, but as something fun to do.

No actual progress has been made yet, but I figured I would post the "before" photos. Hope to start covering it in hardware cloth soon! Now for a little walk-thru. Any feedback is appreciated since at this point I have not done any of the construction!

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View looking down the long side of the deck....I plan to fence in the section that is halfway down the deck (where you see the support column about halfway down), to the end of the deck (that you see in the background near the evergreen bushes). Full human sized access door will be partially crossing the span of the brown mulch you see. In other words, the access is from under the deck, not from the lawn/grass/yard side of the aviary. I need to measure the actual dimensions, but the area of brown mulch from the house to the edge of the deck is probably about 5 feet wide.


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View looking at the section I plan to fence in. It is tough to see on the photo, but the "deck" of the deck actually overhangs the supports by a little bit on the front and left sides, so the hardware cloth will be "inset" from the edges of the actual deck. Need to measure actual span left to right, but this is about 8-10 feet.


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Photo showing the current mulch that is under the deck. You can see that after a rain, there is still a good strip of ground that remains dry. This is mostly because this is up against the house, but also because the house has pretty deep eaves that extend out from the structure. I plan to construct some sort of little dog house type structure for the quail to shelter in if they are smart enough to seek it out.....the jury is out about if they would be smart enough to seek a place to get out of the elements.....
Will mix up the ground in the aviary to have sections that remain like you see it, as well as sections for dust bath, rooting around for treats, etc... Will ensure there is a good chunk that remains constantly dry even after rain. I know weeds will grow anywhere, but the fact that I have some against the house in this photo gives me some hope about how much light gets in there. These photos are recent, and I live in the PNW, so it has not exactly been sunny around here....


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Photo from under the deck looking towards the outside right corner of the future aviary. I plan to fence in against the support column, so as I mentioned earlier, this will make the hardware cloth actually be somewhat "under" the deck/roof. I need to measure the actual height, but I am standing under there and have some head room to spare. I am not tall, but I am thinking this is about 6 to 6.5 feet from ground to the joists you see on the top.


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Looking down the length of the deck. Planning to fence in from the first to the second support column. Not much else to say!


Thoughts? See any glaring issues? I will keep posting updates as I actually start construction.

---EDITED ON 3/15/16 TO INCLUDE DIMENSIONS---

107.5 inches wide/between support columns = just under 9 feet
88 inches high from dirt to ceiling = 7.3 feet head space
80 inches deep from front of deck to wall of house = 6.6 feet

Call it 55 square feet on the conservative side.

For how bad I am at estimating, I was pretty close to the actual dimensions when I guessed while writing my original post! Hahaha.

 

[Em Ty]

That looks like a perfect fit, Paneubert. I can't wait to see it happen.

 

[gardenisto]

How will you attach the hardware cloth to the house exterior for the back and front(human access side)... will you be anchoring to the wall, or a post in the ground? If you wanted to do the same thing, and your predators were mostly neighbors dogs... I wonder if you could just fit a dog run under there... Looking forward to seeing this happen.

 

[horsekeeper]

I've been thinking of raising quail here in upstate NY where it can get down to -20 for several days in the winter. Would something like this work for quail? It is 6X16 and 6-foot high and the coop portion is 6X6.

 

[Em Ty]

That will definitely work. You need to make sure there's ventilation up high in the coop and no drafts, but you won't need to heat it. Water will be your biggest issue, but you can build a recirculating system that will work at those temps.

 

[paneubert]

How will you attach the hardware cloth to the house exterior for the back and front(human access side)... will you be anchoring to the wall, or a post in the ground? If you wanted to do the same thing, and your predators were mostly neighbors dogs... I wonder if you could just fit a dog run under there... Looking forward to seeing this happen.

The dog run thing might not be a bad idea, even if just to have a pre-made door and frame. My plan currently was to just staple or washer/screw the hardware cloth to the frame and support posts of the existing deck, and then where it interfaces with the side of the house I will just nail/screw right into the siding the same way as I am doing with the deck. But now that you mention it, maybe it would make more sense to screw a 2 by 4 or 4 by 4 post into the siding of the house and then secure the hardware cloth to/around that instead. A lot less holes/screws in my house that way! Maybe I will bury a post next to the house wall and not attach it to the house at all. Maybe make that the hinge side of my access door. Will have to look into it.

I do plan to add two additional horizontal braces between the deck support columns. One at about midway up between the ground and the deck/roof, and one at ground level to give me something sturdy to tack the hardware cloth to and also to keep the predators from just pushing the cloth aside and squeezing under. That way I can also simply use two rolls of hardware cloth that are each only 3 or 4 feet "tall". Can fence in the entire aviary with only two horizontal/continuous runs of hardware cloth in my mental plan. On the side with the access door (one of the shorter sides), I will need to build a framework for the actual door, but planned to do the same horizontal framing to the left and right of the door at ground level and at about hip height. I hope to have some time tomorrow to get some precise measurements so that I can start buying some building materials.

 

[Em Ty]

But now that you mention it, maybe it would make more sense to screw a 2 by 4 or 4 by 4 post into the siding of the house and then secure the hardware cloth to/around that instead. A lot less holes/screws in my house that way! Maybe I will bury a post next to the house wall and not attach it to the house at all. Maybe make that the hinge side of my access door. Will have to look into it.

That's definitely better than screwing into your siding.

 

[gardenisto]

I agree with not going direct into siding. I wouldnt want to do that, so I asked and threw out the dog run idea. What ever you choose please post updates.