I must admit it! I am addicted to chickens...why else would I be making a third coop? There is something in the homesteading world called "Chicken Math", it is where you just want another breed because the feathers are so pretty, or they lay a pretty blue egg, or you have a broody Momma hen and you let her sit on a clutch of eggs and then...another hen goes broody and you just can't say no to them sitting on eggs of that breed you wanted and got hatching eggs for...things like that make you have to build more housing. I also am trying to breed heritage breeds of chickens and chickens that are either on the endangered list or the watch list....that and the fact that I love all the colored chicken eggs too makes it kind of rough.
I finally decided to do an inventory of my chickens by breed, I have 130! But I am pretty sure that number will fluctuate. I know we will have to process some roosters soon. I have a lot of roosters and I really just want to keep one of each breed for breeding purposes. Think of the joy you get from having a child born into the world, at this stage in my life my chickens are like my kids. Only I can incubate a chicken egg in 21 days...so I can have new babies every three weeks if I want to! Not that I would do that, but I could...hmmm, yes...I could, and I have been wanting some Welsumers.
Anyway, about the new coop...I decided to modify my grow out pen that I originally built for the ducks. It basically was four panels that had 1/2 inch screen cloth on them and I had made it so I could pull a metal rod in each corner to take it apart and move it. Well...I can't move it any more. I have put a piece of 3/4 inch plywood on half of it and built up from there. I wanted it tall enough to stand up in too, so it is 8 feet tall at the front down to seven feet tall at the back. I guess it would be considered a lean-to style, it makes it easier to build that way. I am not an expert at construction and I really just start with an idea when I start building things, and make it up as I go. I know it drives my husband crazy at times, but it is hard for me to describe how I need things to function. The actual inside section of this coop is probably only three feet deep, but it is eight feet in length, it has double doors on the front so I can open it up pretty wide to clean it, the floor of it actually sits on top of the previously made grow out pen, so it is thirty-six inches high. The whole thing is eight feet square. We put a metal roof on top of this one too, and it will have metal siding on it as soon as I get to that part.
It is a work in progress. We put an 8 foot roost in the coop section and I made all the chickens assigned to that pen get on it to roost for the night, night before last...it got down to 23 degrees and they are almost all my current laying hens. I did not realize how bad a chickens eyesight is at dusk...Ok, it was dark outside...but I could see them. I picked them up and tried to place them on the roost in the coop, but I am a little too short to reach that far up and over by about six inches. I am just glad I had on long sleeves and heavy leather gloves! The chickens would hold on for dear life to my gloved hand and would not jump those few inches onto the roost. I had chickens flying all over inside the coop, they kept jumping up at the windows...at the light basically, what was left of it anyway. I got them all up into the coop, a little over half onto the roost and the others settled on the floor. They all survived the 23 degree temperatures and they four roosters didn't kill each other, so it is all good. I am almost finished putting the screening up on the front and sides of the run section of the coop, I just have to figure out how to modify the door to work now...and put the siding on. But, I still have to build a shelter for the ducks...
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