The girls are doing well in there new home

The Gateway is almost complete.

I still have to etch the name of the chicken run in the top plate.

Rooster ... the Great Protector

Starting the day

Looking for food

Like I said, Rooster... the Great Protector

I say Boy! Get out of here with that camera you're scaring my ladies.

I can see the light at the end of the coop

We've come a long way from this.

                                                                                                                                                                      13 July 2013

To this!

                                                                                                                                                            5 September 2013

The chicken coop project is finally coming into the home stretch although there is probably 20 or so hours left to fine tune things. At this point though the bigger chickens could move in this weekend.

The hatchlings have been living on the bottom for some time now and are quite comfortable in their new home.

Funny how you think a project might take a weekend or two and it takes several … months.

Brick work ... almost

The chicken run is adjacent to the storage container and there was a big gap underneath the container that needed to be filled.

This gap is a problem because it would be an open door for coons, snakes and another animal that wanted a quick meal.

The boys and I took the most inexpensive way to fill the gap using materials collected around the homestead … cedar logs and rocks.

Mixing up the mortar

Working the gap

Finished!

Worked out pretty well if I do say so myself.

Moving along

Stripping palettes 

Tink, tink ... tink, tink

Chicken Roost

Cleaning up

The chicken coop's coming along

Okay, it's taking longer than I thought but it's getting there.

Bottom's complete and the Guineafowls have been at home ever since

Most of the fencing in complete.

Gate's in.

Nesting boxes are in place

Roof framed.

Maybe 30 hours left.

I'll keep you posted

Update on the chicken run

Posts dug in and set for the fencing

The kids help set the post

Plumb

Post filled and pressed with dirt

Echo, the young ones and I started on the bottom of the coop.

As you can see one chicken knows all this effort is for them or at lest him. 

Our new Chicken Coop

Our friend’s Rick and Marlo were generous enough to give us a chicken coop they no longer needed. The trick was to get it from their property to ours.

In comes John, so we went next-door wrapped some chains around the coop, 

lifted it up, and started the ½ mile journey. 

Trying to stabilize the coop from swinging.

Didn't work!

Somewhere between there and here things went awry.

John went up an incline in the road, the backhoe bounced, the legs hit the ground and broke off and the bucket went through the roof.

Quite entertaining to say the least.

Hey John do you have a match?

All was not lost; we continued on our way, repaired the legs, and set it in position. After John left Echo and I went back over the legs, straighten them out, and reinforced them.

Today we’ll work on the top portion and dry in the roof.

Things are coming together.

Chicken Run

We have an area between the storage container and the carport that the pervious homesteaders piled a huge mound of dirt and debris in. Judith and I thought it would be perfect place for a chicken run so we started the plan in motion.

Our friend John came out on Saturday with his backhoe and cleared the area for us. Two hours later the area proved to be a perfect spot for the chickens which will be next to the garden.

This gives us the ability to use their poop as fertilizer for the raised bed and not have to walk that far.

Next will be the goat pen.

Before

Clearing the easy way ... by machine

Trimming the trees

After ... The hard part done!