The Old Folks Home

[superchemicalgirl]

oh, I also want more people to praise me on my fantabulous building skills.

Totally rocks!

sure nothing is level, but the eggs don't fall out of the nest boxes, and the coops haven't collapsed on the heads of the poultry.


wahahahaha

I totally rock

We also have a free-form coop from scraps. There's definitely classism here on the farm: the goats have a nice house that we built, the chickens and turkeys likewise have a great coop. The ducks? They got whatever we could throw together from scraps.





Wisher, if you're using cattle panels, think about a hoop house.

 

[vehve]

I was going to suggest super glue as well, but Al beat me to it.

chickadoodles, thanks. Here's a slightly better pic.

The one on the right is full length, and it's cut off at a 60deg angle at the top to make room for the broom handle that serves as a ridge brace and handle. The left one is about 2" shorter, and attached to the right one at a 60deg angle. The bottom one is about 4" shorter than the right one, and attaches between the uprights also with 60deg angle cuts.


Instead of a triangle supporting the middle, I've got two broom handles attached to each other supporting the middle. With cattle panels that would probably not be necessary, but these compost panels are a bit flimsier. This would stand nicely without the ridge support too, but I wanted to make sure it's sturdy, and it makes a nice handle for when we finally get Hilma into her real pen and can start using this as the tractor it's supposed to be.



The real bunny pen is coming along nicely too. I just got the roof installed, and I'm really liking this Onduline stuff. Super easy to cut with an angle grinder, and you can just screw right through it. The screws were a bit costly at 9.90€ per 100, but I thought it best to use the intended screws to get it as water proof as possible. The sheets were super light to carry, and installation was a breeze.

I made horizontal supports for it out of the same panel I'm using as siding, and then I just screwed the sheets to that.









I think we might get this thing finished tomorrow. Then I need to write up a coop article on it, even though it's meant for bunnies this would be great for chickens too.

 

[chickadoodles]

Thanks SCG and vehve for sharing your pics I would love a chicken tractor type pen. I need to grow out some turkey and chickens I have plenty of left over posts and 1x4's and two rolls of wire.
I think a tractor would be nice so we don't have dig any more holes for posts! That would be the best part!

vehve your bunny pen is nice and would work great with chickens also. People are always looking for new ideas.

 

[vehve]

Once it's finished I'm interested to see what kind of feedback it will get on Facebook, Karin is in some backyard meat rabbits group there, and every time someone posts a pic of their setup that doesn't have a wire bottom, most people are in shock, wondering if it's even possible to keep bunnies on a solid floor. I think the square footage is a bit more than what most people are used to there too, this thing will basically be just for one bunny, and of course it's offspring, but they'll be pretty small most of the time, and then they'll be tasty, and not taking up space in there.

 

[chickadoodles]

Once it's finished I'm interested to see what kind of feedback it will get on Facebook, Karin is in some backyard meat rabbits group there, and every time someone posts a pic of their setup that doesn't have a wire bottom, most people are in shock, wondering if it's even possible to keep bunnies on a solid floor. I think the square footage is a bit more than what most people are used to there too, this thing will basically be just for one bunny, and of course it's offspring, but they'll be pretty small most of the time, and then they'll be tasty, and not taking up space in there.

It is a nice pen. Bunny's will dig that may be why they are shocked. Our rabbits dug under the sidewalk so the doe could have her kits in her nest there. When they were 6 weeks old she would kick them out and have another litter and Mr. Buggs would take over with the older bunch and he kept them in the dog house. We had our running loose in our back yard with a 6' cinder block privacy fence. They could have dug under the fence but they never did. They shared the yard with the dogs and birds.

 

[vehve]

I buried a net about a foot down in this one, it will be interesting to see if she digs a lot in there. I'm also interested to see if she'll take advantage of the two story construction, the breeder said that both Hilma and her sister like climbing.

 

[Wisher1000]

This thing will basically be just for one bunny, and of course it's offspring, but they'll be pretty small most of the time, and then they'll be tasty, and not taking up space in there.

Vehve, there will be no offspring if you only keep one bunny, sorry.

I'm sending you a PM to explain how it all works.






No, on second thought, ask Karin.

 

[vehve]

Wisher, don't worry, Hilma paid a visit to a gentleman a week and a half ago, we just didn't see any point in getting our own buck. The kits should plop out April 10th.

Did I understand your construction right, you're building something similar to my bunny tractor out of cattle panels?

 

[Wisher1000]

Yes, it is almost identical. I am still in the planning stage, though. I would love to have a hoop house like SCG posted, but none of the ground around here is level and there would be gaps underneath that I would have to fill every time I moved it. It sure would be a lot more square footage.......

SCG, what are the dimensions of that hoop coop? I am assuming the panels are 16' long. I have three panels that are 50'' x 16' (each) so one side of the base frame would be 12 1/2', but what is the other? And how tall is it in the middle?

 

[vehve]

If you make it a perfect curve, the distance between the ends should be 16'/(½pi) or about 10 feet.Then it would only be 5 feet tall though, so I'd make it a bit narrower to make room to walk in there, maybe 7-8 feet?