Keeping chickens

Discussion in 'Pets Corner' started by Lochan, Sep 1, 2015.

  1. Lochan

    Lochan Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    OK, as if I don't have enough animals about the place I have a fancy for rescuing some ex-battery hens and giving them a decent life whilst enjoying some fresh eggs. We have a decent sized garden and although I would love to let them free range, we have a lot of foxes around, including one which rears a litter every year in the field next to the garden. So I have planned a fox-proof coop and enclosure which is 6 x 6m, i only want 3-4 hens, and I can enrich the environment with perches, log piles, dust baths etc. The area I would put them in currently is a clay based soil covered with weedproof membrane and 3cm of pebbles. My question to any seasoned hen-keepers out there is what would be the best thing to do with the current gravel surface? I could lift it and turf the ground but I suspect it would rapidly turn to smelly chicken-poo covered mud in the winter and that would not be good for them. The hens would obviously like something they can scratch about in, but I need something that I can keep clean reasonably easily. Suggestions from seasoned chicken-keepers warmly welcomed.
     
  2. kateincornwall

    kateincornwall Registered Users

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    How lovely , I love chickens . The ones we kept in France were free range, but just thinking on my feet, could you maybe lift the gravel from half the area, mix some sharp sand with the clay soil to lighten it ?
     
  3. Lochan

    Lochan Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    Yes, I could certainly lift half of it and apply sand. What do you think about the current pebbles? I thought they might be a bit big and cause foot problems in the hens.
     
  4. Oberon

    Oberon Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    You'll love having your own eggs :)

    Get rid of the pebbles and weed mat, put down some sheets of welded metal mesh (to stop foxes digging in) and then chuck in a 20-30cm layer of organic material - autumn leaves, straw, wood shavings, garden clippings, whatever. The chickens will dig and dig in this, turning it into lovely mulch for your garden. The deep layer will drain well. Chickens want to dig in leaf litter and the like - they evolved as rainforest floor animals, fossicking in leaf litter all day.

    You can put a timber base round the bottom to keep everything in - I use 20cm high treated pine sleepers.

    Is the planned site in a part of your garden that water runs away from or runs too?

    What are you planning to do to make it fox proof - what are your plans for walls, roof and materials?

    6m x 6m is heaps of space for 3-4 chooks. Your ex-battery hens might take a little while to get used to it, but once they do they'll be in heaven :)
     
  5. Oberon

    Oberon Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    Just to add.... The 'deep litter' method described above doesn't get smelly as the chickens are constantly aerating it. Just keep adding dry carbon based matter to top it up. Every 6 months to a year or so take 80% of it out and replace (keep 20% to 'seed' the new litter with all the good bacteria). The 80% you take out will be fab for your garden.
     
  6. Lochan

    Lochan Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    The run will be made of scaffolding poles with a waterproof gazebo roof with the walls made of thick welded chicken mesh (not thin rabbit wire) sunk 20cm underground with railway sleepers around the perimeter to discourage foxes digging in. Welded mesh on the ground is an easy addition. I have a massive free supply of autumn leaves and grass and plant clippings and can easily add straw/hay and wood shavings but the leaves are usually wet and the grass clippings often are as well so wouldn't this cause a bit of a wet environment for their feet? Or do you just only add dry leaves etc on the annual dry Autumn day? Would they go for a heap of grass clippings they could just rake about in rather than scattering them about the whole run? The planned site is on a slight slope and drains well with no water running off the garden into it. It has a fence with large conifers on one side, a large privet hedge on another side, and a big shed on the third but rain would blow into the run from one side. Their coop would be an Omlet Eglu which we already have left over from a prolonged period of guinea pig ownership from when my sons were younger - Omlet sell a conversion kit to make it suitable for chickens. There are tree stumps on site and a couple of small cherry trees to frolic about under. I'm ridiculously excited about it actually, I really need to get out a bit more.....
     
  7. Oberon

    Oberon Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    Well it is exciting!! :)

    If you cover the floor in mesh you won't need to dig in the walls. Digging down 20cm probably isn't enough. Another option is to lay mesh flat on the ground about 40cm (at least) out from the walls, and peg it down with heavy duty tent pegs. Cover it with some dirt. Foxes dig at the base of fences so having a mesh 'skirt' fools them. But honestly I'd go with the full mesh floor. It really hurts to lose your birds to foxes....

    Your birds will love a thick layer of litter over the whole floor. It's the best way to keep them happy and the coop smell-free, and to minimise work for yourself. Since you're adding a waterproof roof dampness of the litter is not going to be a problem. The litter should stay pretty dry. It's fine to add damp stuff though. I have deep litter and just a wire roof, so the rain falls through and it's always a bit damp except in the height of summer. The birds are fine :)
     
  8. bbrown

    bbrown Moderator Forum Supporter

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    i have absolutely nothing to contribute to this other than my avid fascination :D
     
  9. JulieT

    JulieT Registered Users

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    I reckon these birds are going to be lucky rescue hens....
     
  10. Lochan

    Lochan Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    Did you know there is a 4-6 week waiting list for rescue hens? Plenty of time to set up the coop and run I suppose. When they arrive apparently you have to make sure the perches are pretty much flat to the ground as their legs are so weak they can't climb onto them. A few weeks of decent grub and a space to exercise and develop some muscle and exhibit normal behaviours should sort that out though. A friend of mine rescues hens and says one of the most rewarding things she has ever seen was when a poor featherless ex-battery hen took its first dust bath in the sunshine in her garden.....
     
  11. snowbunny

    snowbunny Registered Users

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  12. Lochan

    Lochan Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    Great video, those cows look happy to be out again.

    And yes, I must video/photograph the hens and their progress.
     
  13. Oberon

    Oberon Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    When you say 'scaffolding poles' - what are they? Foxes can climb up timber poles so....Is the roof going to be impenetrable to foxes as well? Truly fox proof means strong mesh or solid barriers on all four walls, roof and floor.

    Also, if you're joining wire mesh overlap the panels by a least 10cm, and clip with wire clips every 10cm top and bottom of the join. If you're using the really solid mesh sheets that almost stand up by themselves you don't need to overlap but do clip every 10cm still.

    Mesh on walls should have holes no bigger than 2.5cm x 2.5cm (so the chooks can't put heads through). Mesh on floor and roof should have gaps no bigger than 5cm x 5cm or at most 7.5 x 5cm (so foxes can't get through).

    I'm quite paranoid about foxes....
     
  14. Lochan

    Lochan Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    The scaffolding poles are steel to give rigidity and also to weight-bear a solid roof. I'm pretty confident I can make this fox-proof having kept the guinea pigs safe for years - we lost one guinea to a weasel attack but the foxes were defeated despite finding them in the garden on a regular basis. The one major stumbling block now is checking the deeds of the house to make sure keeping poultry isn't banned (surprisingly common apparently even if you own the land freehold).
     
  15. Oberon

    Oberon Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    Yeah, it's the same here - quite common to have limits or bans on keeping poultry (but fortunately not where I live).

    Sounds like you have the fox angles all covered. We have heaps here too.

    Just another thought about perches - nice and study is the go, about as thick as your ankle. Branches are ideal.

    Would love to see pics of progress when you get started :)
     
  16. Lochan

    Lochan Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    Sounds like the hens will be competing with Tarka and Lochan for ankle thick branches.....

    I'll take some photos this weekend, planning on concreting in the scaffolding poles and shifting the gravel in Stage 1 of Operation Rescue Hens......Stage 2 will be the following weekend with floor, roof and welded mesh added....Stage 3 of creating a deep litter and adding log piles, perches, dust baths, etc will have to wait a bit until the Davis Cup is over.....then Stage 4 of release the ladies into their new home once they arrive. My Eglu coop has a 2m run on it already (for the guinea pigs). As these hens will not know what outside is all about I think I'll confine them to the coop and 2m run for a short time before opening the run into the big pen..
     
  17. Oberon

    Oberon Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    That sounds like a good idea, to get them used to the space gradually.

    They are going to love the environment you're making for them.

    Chooks love fresh greens. I grow stuff in the garden and toss it into the coop, but some people make a small garden bed in the coop with a removable wire top. The chooks can peck at what grows to the level of the wire, but not get in and dig. Even growing grass in that way is good. Any perennial green crop works though, or a mix of things. Anyway, just one 'mod con' I've seen some people do :)

    Was thinking it might be handy to fence off a small internal space in the pen that you can put the chooks into when you're cleaning out or adding material into the pen. But I guess you could just use the Eglu run for that. Always useful to have a spare area to pop the hens in.
     
  18. JulieT

    JulieT Registered Users

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    Very exciting. Will the hens get on with each other? I mean, aren't they all separated in tiny cages as battery hens. Will sharing a cage be strange. (I know that I know zilch about hens, just in case this is a dumb question.....)
     
  19. Oberon

    Oberon Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    They will be fine :) There'll be a process of working out who defers to who over what, but once that's sorted they should get along fine.

    Space is usually the solution with any behavioural problem with chooks and Lochan is giving them a nice big space so I'd say all will be well.
     
  20. Lochan

    Lochan Supporting Member Forum Supporter

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    There could be a bit of an issue initially sorting out the pecking order but as long as they have plenty of space and more than one area to feed and drink so any bullying is minimised they should hopefully get along just fine. Great idea about an internal grass bed for them - really easy to do and enriches the environment beautifully. I quite like building things and growing things and looking after animals and just being outside generally - mooching in the garden with the dogs, cats and chickens and building things/doing things with them all will suit me just fine. Clicker-trained hens doing agility anyone??
     

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