The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[delisha]

That was a really nice article. It really showed off your nice place and what a conscientious person you are. Cute kid too!

 

[mrsamplias]

My daughter just wrote this blog post...somehow about me! She works for the Elkhart Truth (Newspaper) in Elkhart, IN and has just started writing a food blog. The blog is brand new so not a lot of followers yet. If you take a look, please leave a comment! I'm sure she'd appreciate the traffic and feedback...it's always nice knowing that someone is reading!

http://blogs.etruth.com/singinginth...m=rss&utm_campaign=my-mom-builds-a-food-mecca

All the way down at the bottom are some pictures of sprouts and the chickens!

love it! great photos! It's not often that a daughter so admires her mother! Job well done!

 

[Leahs Mom]

I have cleaned and cleaned getting ready for the holidays, and I still have not found my camera card. Looks like I have to buy another one. I have a feeling I threw it away with one of my walk by the garbage can.

Bummer. (And I thought that kind of stuff only happened to me!

)

That was a really nice article. It really showed off your nice place and what a conscientious person you are. Cute kid too!

love it! great photos! It's not often that a daughter so admires her mother! Job well done!

Thanks! She had just cut her LONG hair all off for "Locks of Love" and I'm not used to seeing her with the short hair!

 

[Sally8]

Very nice article! You must be very proud of your daughter. Am I the only one that doesn't have a camera that takes such beautiful, crisp picture's? (Or is it the picture taker?, lol). Thanks for sharing it. Sue

edited to change our to your, lol

 

[lalaland]

Leah's Mom,
your daughters blog was really sweet. I'm glad you posted the link. Left a comment for her, blogging can be hard and you are right, it is nice to know someone is reading!

All these coop pics are making me green w envy. Mine is very very utilitarian (yup, the converted construction trailer). The coop section is in what used to be the "office", the other half of the trailer is my garden shed. Now that it is winter and the hens are so danged reluctant to go outside, I open the door between the coop section and my shed section and let them use that little bit of floor space too. I have some bushel baskets on a shelf, and after a few days of no eggs, got to wondering....and sure enough, they were laying in the basket up on the shelf. I wouldn't have thought they could get in there!

1 below zero here. Sun is going to come out, I'll give the girls some left over shrimp, left over cheese and left over sausage for bkfast. THen, oh no, last minute christmas shopping.

Merry xmas everyone, safe travels.

 

[Miss Lydia]

I use my used feed bags for the same purpose. the house my chickens are in was a storage building and it has pieces of 2x4 in the walls vertical which chickens love to sit on so I covered the walls with feed sacks so they can't get to them. kinda like wall paper.

Hill Billy style

 

[Leahs Mom]

Leah's Mom,
your daughters blog was really sweet. I'm glad you posted the link. Left a comment for her, blogging can be hard and you are right, it is nice to know someone is reading!

All these coop pics are making me green w envy. Mine is very very utilitarian (yup, the converted construction trailer). The coop section is in what used to be the "office", the other half of the trailer is my garden shed. Now that it is winter and the hens are so danged reluctant to go outside, I open the door between the coop section and my shed section and let them use that little bit of floor space too. I have some bushel baskets on a shelf, and after a few days of no eggs, got to wondering....and sure enough, they were laying in the basket up on the shelf. I wouldn't have thought they could get in there!

1 below zero here. Sun is going to come out, I'll give the girls some left over shrimp, left over cheese and left over sausage for bkfast. THen, oh no, last minute christmas shopping.

Merry xmas everyone, safe travels.

Thanks lala! One of my co-workers here has a construction trailer coop too! I would have been glad to use whatever I had around when we were looking. I love using stuff like that. I think the next addition will be the cattle panel type like B has. I think i might try one for additional space and/or for if I decide to isolate some newbies or isolate for breeding. I just couldn't beat $250 for the shed since they're about $2000 new here!

Glad you thought to look in the baskets!!!!

 

[Miss Lydia]

Thanks...I have my (very patient) husband to thank for the interior. We got the shed through Habitat for Humanity Re-Store for $250. Hauled it over hear (a friend had a trailer and equipment that was suitable to get it off the property it was on and move it over). Got some vinyl flooring really cheap (I wanted something easy to clean and the floor was wood - I just didn't want it to rot under animals doo doo). My husband had the metal siding (used for trailer exteriors) already laying around (he uses it in his sign business for sign substrates) and he used that on the interior walls (again, for the purpose of easy cleaning. He also had old sheet styrofoam laying around (for other sign and art projects) so he put in some insulation while he was at it.

I won't post photos here of the original interior construction project unless someone wants to see them.

These photos show the updates with the additional area to divide off either for brooding or for a broody. They get the whole area if there isn't any brooding going on, and the dividing door stays open.


Where that straw bale is sitting is where my broody's box is sitting right now and the door between the 2 parts is closed to keep others from laying more eggs inside. (I put the straw bale in there originally for them to have some different levels to jump up on and also for me to sit on if I wanted to just sit out there and watch them)







And here is the regular nest box from the inside out. Just happened to catch 3 in there at the same time which very seldom happens. They often all lay in just 1 or 2 of the boxes.

Before I read the blog I have to comment on your coop, It is so pretty. Tell Hubby he did a fantastic job.

 

[Miss Lydia]

What a great story and the pics are very good too. Okay Leahs Mom will you tell how you do the BOSS sprouting please.

 

[Leahs Mom]

What a great story and the pics are very good too. Okay Leahs Mom will you tell how you do the BOSS sprouting please.

I will tell on the sprouts...was just waiting to get some photos on the other part...