Snow and Tarp question...

[aubreynoramarie]

so here's my run....

it is built into the side of my house which is half brick. the fence to our home is a three foot chain link. i had attatched the chicken wire to the chain link and then staple gunned it into the top half of the first floor of my house with heavy duty staples and a staple gun.

still i am worried that since i arched the wire instead of just pulling it tight (i needed to arch it so it would fit better with my door frame as seen in the picture) it will cave and all of my staples will come out. i want my girls to have this part of their run covered because i dont have any place to put their food and water in their coop. ( the coop is build into our mudroom. its kind of a high rise, but there are other pics for later times to show that) Therefore their food and water is under the tarp (water is taken away at night and as of winter is replaced with luke-warm water in the morning).


ANYWAYS. anyone have any ideas on how to keep their tarps from caving in their roofs in the winter?
heres a pic of the inside of the covered half of the run.

^^^these are my rare pink chickens. they enjoy the snow...^^^

 

[annie3001]

hello.
i use tarps for rain/snow cover in the winter and all year long. i have one that has lasted about 2 years. so i am happy about that. but when it rains ive had to go inside the run and push up on the ceiling, so the water can dump out. (hope that makes sense).
last year with our snow, it wasnt bad, because i had just one run, i could use a long broom to push off the heavy snow. problem for me this year is i have added to the back of the existing run and now its bigger. so i dunno how its going to be. tarps are pretty hardy tho, i bought ours from home depot, and paid a pretty penny for us, but i think so far worth it. as far as "strength" i think a good made fenced properly run is the key. good luck to you!

not the best picture, it has been modified, since taking the photo, just wanted to show you.

I closed off the left side completely. and have only one access inside.

this was a picture of the first winter with the chickens, (note only one run). the tarp held up very well. and if you look closely the run is dry of snow!

heres a "birds eye view" of the run/tarp

 

[WoodlandWoman]

If it was me, I would put some support in for the wire. I would put some framing in and attach the wire to that. Until you can do that, I would brush the snow off as often as you need to, to keep it from caving in. That might be rarely or it might be multiple times during the same snow storm, depending on how much snow you are getting. Cave ins are dangerous for the chickens.

 

[BWKatz]

I would try to attach a 2x4 to the tree and the end of the run to provide extra support.