Hello again...
We was a great deal of excitement here yesterday. We went to an heirloom hatchery in Quebec and we picked up our chickens.
There were hundreds and hundreds of birds there, all ages from day olds to somewhat more mature birds such as we brought home. Ours range in age from 8 to 12 weeks. We had originally ordered 8 birds but selected 2 extra when we were there. I would have loved to bring them all home....they were SO cute.
First of all I have a few shots of the finished chicken coop. Frank put in an enormous amount of work making it predator proof as the pressure is quite high here.
The door that you see on the left leads into a storage/feed room. We have extra straw in there, the feed in a galvanized can and a few tools to use in the coop.
The coop has two windows, one facing south and the other east, both of which have been covered in hardware cloth. There is also a window in the top of the door. I intend to add a hardware cloth covered screen door so they will have more sunshine and also better ventilation. The prevailing wind here is from the west and the feed room is on the west side of the coop to provide a bit of insulation in the winter.
The coop has two pop holes for the birds to exit when we have built the runs. They are secured with locked latches that should prove to be raccoon proof.
Frank installed a ceiling in the coop and we will put insulation up there. The roof has ridge venting for ventilation and there is a trap door in the ceiling that you can raise and lower using a pulley in the feed room. This will help with additional ventilation and also help to draw off the heat in the summer. We have positioned the coop just to the east of a large pine tree which should provide some shade for them during the afternoon heat as well as act as a wind break in the winter.
Inside they have a large roost which will easily allow all of them to roost at night.
There is a decent size dust bath in the corner. It is filled with ordinary garden soil, sifted ash from the woodstove and livestock grade diatomaceous earth. This picture also shows the inside of one of the pop holes with little cross pieces to make it easy for them to climb in and out.
In this picture we have the waterer and the feeder side by side. This morning we moved the feeder to the south wall as there will be less chance of the food ending up in the water which happened overnight.
There are 4 nest boxes with a small ladder to reach them. The nest boxes have a wooden lip at the front to keep eggs from falling out. This photo also shows the pop hole on the east side of the building.
And Now... let me introduce the ladies. There are 10 of them in total.
This little black and white speckled beauty is my favourite. She is a Hamburg. We have decided to call her Hamburger which may seem inappropriate but it seems to fit the little sweetie. She is already getting quite brave and will walk up to me when I enter the coop.
This one is actually a mutant Naked Neck in that she does NOT in fact have a naked neck at all. I really loved her colouring.
This one is an Andalusian. She is basically white but just a few faint grey feathers on her. You can barely make them out around her neck.
We have three of these all black Australorps. The largest of these three has already established herself as the alpha in the coop and has been bullying several of the other birds a bit. Hopefully that will end soon as they become accustomed to their new surroundings.
Lastly we have four Jersey Giants, the bruisers of the egg laying world. The hens can easily weigh in at 10 pounds and they will lay extra large brown eggs.
Here is a nice shot of them all mingling.
I went in to check on them this morning and they were certainly not as skittish around me as they were last night. I want them to be very comfortable with me around them and also, quite frankly, I love to watch them doing their chicken things.
That is it for today. Thanks so much for stopping by. Do leave me any comments or questions that you may have. Have a wonderful weekend. Cheers.
~ Melanie ~
We was a great deal of excitement here yesterday. We went to an heirloom hatchery in Quebec and we picked up our chickens.
There were hundreds and hundreds of birds there, all ages from day olds to somewhat more mature birds such as we brought home. Ours range in age from 8 to 12 weeks. We had originally ordered 8 birds but selected 2 extra when we were there. I would have loved to bring them all home....they were SO cute.
First of all I have a few shots of the finished chicken coop. Frank put in an enormous amount of work making it predator proof as the pressure is quite high here.
The door that you see on the left leads into a storage/feed room. We have extra straw in there, the feed in a galvanized can and a few tools to use in the coop.
The coop has two windows, one facing south and the other east, both of which have been covered in hardware cloth. There is also a window in the top of the door. I intend to add a hardware cloth covered screen door so they will have more sunshine and also better ventilation. The prevailing wind here is from the west and the feed room is on the west side of the coop to provide a bit of insulation in the winter.
Frank installed a ceiling in the coop and we will put insulation up there. The roof has ridge venting for ventilation and there is a trap door in the ceiling that you can raise and lower using a pulley in the feed room. This will help with additional ventilation and also help to draw off the heat in the summer. We have positioned the coop just to the east of a large pine tree which should provide some shade for them during the afternoon heat as well as act as a wind break in the winter.
Inside they have a large roost which will easily allow all of them to roost at night.
In this picture we have the waterer and the feeder side by side. This morning we moved the feeder to the south wall as there will be less chance of the food ending up in the water which happened overnight.
There are 4 nest boxes with a small ladder to reach them. The nest boxes have a wooden lip at the front to keep eggs from falling out. This photo also shows the pop hole on the east side of the building.
And Now... let me introduce the ladies. There are 10 of them in total.
This little black and white speckled beauty is my favourite. She is a Hamburg. We have decided to call her Hamburger which may seem inappropriate but it seems to fit the little sweetie. She is already getting quite brave and will walk up to me when I enter the coop.
This one is actually a mutant Naked Neck in that she does NOT in fact have a naked neck at all. I really loved her colouring.
This one is an Andalusian. She is basically white but just a few faint grey feathers on her. You can barely make them out around her neck.
We have three of these all black Australorps. The largest of these three has already established herself as the alpha in the coop and has been bullying several of the other birds a bit. Hopefully that will end soon as they become accustomed to their new surroundings.
Lastly we have four Jersey Giants, the bruisers of the egg laying world. The hens can easily weigh in at 10 pounds and they will lay extra large brown eggs.
Here is a nice shot of them all mingling.
I went in to check on them this morning and they were certainly not as skittish around me as they were last night. I want them to be very comfortable with me around them and also, quite frankly, I love to watch them doing their chicken things.
That is it for today. Thanks so much for stopping by. Do leave me any comments or questions that you may have. Have a wonderful weekend. Cheers.
~ Melanie ~
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