Construction...Who Needs It?

I have discovered that you cannot have a farm without constant construction.  I have always been kind of crafty and not afraid to tackle things but it seems like I am always trying to build things out here.

When we first moved out to the country, we had to fix up the house and we did a lot of the work ourselves.  My surrogate son Mark worked on things we just didn't know anything about, like plumbing issues.  I can change a faucet on a sink, but so far that is the extent of my plumbing resume.    My husband can do some electrical, but we had to have a new water heater put in after only being here a short while...and moved the location of it so that we could have a larger water heater.  Mark and Crew teamed up for that one.  Anyway, it is a lot of work...but that is not what I am talking about today.

I built four gates for my breeding pens yesterday, they are nothing fancy, just a wood frame and welded wire fencing for the most part.  I made the pens out of fence wire awhile back ago.  They are about 8'x8' for the most part...and there are 8 of them.  I have also been working on a grow out pen, I made it out of wood, cattle panel fencing, welded wire hardware cloth and will use a heavy tarp on the top to keep the rain out.  You have to have a place to put your animals...and it is a lot better to have a place to put them before you have them!  I have a bunch of chicks in brooders and need more space for them.  I have not felt well twice, since I started construction of the grow out pen and because of that I stole the Rooster Condo to put one large batch into...I let the roosters go back into the main coop.  That is why I made the doors yesterday...too many roosters are terrorizing my hens.  We got one gate up yesterday, my husband caught the roosters we let out of the Condo and put them in the pen with the new gate.  I am hoping to get more gates put up today and at least the shade cloth over them.  I have a large tarp to put over them too for when it rains but I have to figure out a way to make the water run off it, I learned that if I don't I will have to bail it out every time it rains.

I am getting better at construction, and figuring out it is good to build things well the first time.  I have a pen we call the Lowboy, it is a movable pen with wheels...I stapled hardware cloth to it with individual staples that you have to hammer in.  The weight of water on the tarp I covered it with has pulled the wire from the staples, I may have to do some work on it too.  I have two mean roosters in it...ok, maybe not mean...overly aggressive towards the ladies would be a better word for it.  I have way too many roosters and those born in February are coming of age and they too need to be penned separately.  I see a lot of chicken and dumplings in our future.