- Joined
- May 27, 2012
- Messages
- 5,194
- Location
- Bellmere, QLD
- Website
- www.selfsufficientme.com
- Climate
- Sub-Tropical
- Admin
- #1
There's a million things I'm trying to get done here on our property and two big jobs or issues are clearing fallen or dangerous trees and fixing my poultry pen (which was also damaged in a storm from a falling tree) also making it snake, goanna, and crow proof so I decided to combine the fallen tree clearing with the pen build!
Basically, although my poultry pen is actually fox proof we still lose eggs to goannas and crows and the odd bird to large pythons so something needs to be done to rectify this problem before spring hits and the warmer weather brings back the pesky wildlife.
About 8 years ago I decided to build our poultry pen for our ducks, chickens, and quail down the back of our property in and amongst a heavily treed area. The main reason for this was to make use of the natural shade because we live in a subtropical climate and a naturally shaded area is very helpful for the birds plus the bush setting offered an excellent free-range area for the flock - it's also just a perfect position away from the house. I used as many trees as possible as posts to create the pen and to blend into the surroundings (also save costs) and to this day I have no regrets as it has worked out great.
However, being in a treed location also has several disadvantages besides the wildlife there's fallen branches, and trees to deal with but thankfully trees or damage by them doesn't happen often, although, when it does it makes lots of work!
Anyway, I always like to reuse and recycle whenever possible so for this chicken run project I'll be using as much of the wood I've cut up from fallen trees as possible for the framework.
Before I go further, I have to admit I'm a dog of a builder. My Grandfather was an accomplished carpenter and built several houses but I've never been good with wood so yes I know I'm a hack and many of my projects don't follow any sound building principles but if I do say so myself when I build a structure (like my quail pen) it does stay built even though it might not look pretty... usually when I build something it works and lasts.
Initially, I did consider enclosing my whole poultry pen - effectively retro re-designing it to make it crow and reptile proof but I decided against this for several reasons: the size of our poultry pen would have meant lots of materials, cost, effort, and time; plus, a mesh roof over such a big area under trees would only gather a heap of debris.
Therefore, I decided to build a small run coming off the main chook house, which will essentially become an extension to their nesting area of roughly 3 x 8 metres. This run will have heavy gauge aviary mesh around the base and halfway up the side walls the other top half of the walls and the roof will be fitted with small holed chicken wire. To enclose the full run roof and sides with heavy gauge aviary mesh (just like my quail pen) would be a waste of money because it's not necessary when ordinary chicken wire will do, but I did want the heavy gauge stuff around the base of the run as it lasts longer and is obviously better able to withstand ground attack from larger animals trying to push through.
I'll also fit a separate access door to the run so entry can be gained from outside the main pen, which means I'll soon have two doors one for the main pen and one just for the run. The chickens will have their own small automatic door on a timer to open at around 9am allowing them to move internally into the main pen area - this door will automatically close at nightfall.
Overall, the security plan for our poultry has 3 tiers and works like this:
Foxes generally only attack poultry at dusk, dawn, and through the night - yes, there are rare occasions when foxes may have a go at hens throughout the day but a dog proof fence does an effective job at deterring them enough during daylight hours so that's why I let my birds out mid-morning to their free-ranging area.
In the evening before dark, we lock our poultry up into their fox proof pen, which is still a large area but small enough to be manageable. This used to be good enough (for about 6 years) until snakes, crows, and large lizards found it.
That's where the enclosed run comes into play - my theory is the enclosed run coming off the hen house with a small automatic chicken door opening at around 9am each day will be enough to keep the ducks, chickens, and eggs safe because pythons only come out at night (when the run will be locked down) and even if the goannas find their way through the open automatic chicken door during the day it'll only be after 9am and usually I've collected the duck eggs and most chicken eggs by then. In the past, our eggs (mainly duck eggs) usually go missing between sun up and about 7am - ducks tend to lay eggs very early morning or through the night so the wildlife has become used to getting into the pen to collect the eggs before I can (in particular the crows).
Once the run is built, crows won't have the guts to enter a small run doorway and then make it all the way several metres into the chook house to raid the chicken nesting boxes or duck clutches in the ground so that should solve that problem. We'll see!
While I'm at it I'm going to make another duck nesting area at the front of the run because currently the ducks camp and nest under the chickens nesting boxes in the coop so I'm thinking they will enjoy having their own area. If you look very closely at the image below through the coop door on the ground is our mother pekin duck sitting on her nest (the white thing)...
The image below shows how it looks at the moment - So far, I've used two h4 2.4m posts for the door frame at the front (one post was already there as a fence post before the tree fell through it) and have cemented in 4 hardwood logs/posts (cut from fallen trees) with another post to go on the left (near the feed bin) then the rest of the "posts" will be live trees. The cross beams between the posts for the walls will be raw wood but the top roof beams will be commercial lengths except for the top beam across the front of the chook house because I do have a perfect log long enough and about the right size to use for that.
This image below shows my awful drawing skills
It's pretty self-explanatory if you can be bothered to carefully examine my rough sketch and notes...
The mess in the front of the pen are some old logs used as a anti-dig barrier from before the large gum tree crushed the fence and there's still some of this gum tree left to cut up. It's all a bit of a mess at the moment but I hope to tidy it up and complete the build of the run by Thursday this week.
Basically, although my poultry pen is actually fox proof we still lose eggs to goannas and crows and the odd bird to large pythons so something needs to be done to rectify this problem before spring hits and the warmer weather brings back the pesky wildlife.
About 8 years ago I decided to build our poultry pen for our ducks, chickens, and quail down the back of our property in and amongst a heavily treed area. The main reason for this was to make use of the natural shade because we live in a subtropical climate and a naturally shaded area is very helpful for the birds plus the bush setting offered an excellent free-range area for the flock - it's also just a perfect position away from the house. I used as many trees as possible as posts to create the pen and to blend into the surroundings (also save costs) and to this day I have no regrets as it has worked out great.
However, being in a treed location also has several disadvantages besides the wildlife there's fallen branches, and trees to deal with but thankfully trees or damage by them doesn't happen often, although, when it does it makes lots of work!
Anyway, I always like to reuse and recycle whenever possible so for this chicken run project I'll be using as much of the wood I've cut up from fallen trees as possible for the framework.
Before I go further, I have to admit I'm a dog of a builder. My Grandfather was an accomplished carpenter and built several houses but I've never been good with wood so yes I know I'm a hack and many of my projects don't follow any sound building principles but if I do say so myself when I build a structure (like my quail pen) it does stay built even though it might not look pretty... usually when I build something it works and lasts.
Initially, I did consider enclosing my whole poultry pen - effectively retro re-designing it to make it crow and reptile proof but I decided against this for several reasons: the size of our poultry pen would have meant lots of materials, cost, effort, and time; plus, a mesh roof over such a big area under trees would only gather a heap of debris.
Therefore, I decided to build a small run coming off the main chook house, which will essentially become an extension to their nesting area of roughly 3 x 8 metres. This run will have heavy gauge aviary mesh around the base and halfway up the side walls the other top half of the walls and the roof will be fitted with small holed chicken wire. To enclose the full run roof and sides with heavy gauge aviary mesh (just like my quail pen) would be a waste of money because it's not necessary when ordinary chicken wire will do, but I did want the heavy gauge stuff around the base of the run as it lasts longer and is obviously better able to withstand ground attack from larger animals trying to push through.
I'll also fit a separate access door to the run so entry can be gained from outside the main pen, which means I'll soon have two doors one for the main pen and one just for the run. The chickens will have their own small automatic door on a timer to open at around 9am allowing them to move internally into the main pen area - this door will automatically close at nightfall.
Overall, the security plan for our poultry has 3 tiers and works like this:
- A dog proof free-ranging area (about 1/2 acre) contained within our existing boundary fence.
- A fox proof poultry pen contained within a dog proof free-ranging area.
- A complete predator proof poultry house and run contained within a fox proof poultry pen.
Foxes generally only attack poultry at dusk, dawn, and through the night - yes, there are rare occasions when foxes may have a go at hens throughout the day but a dog proof fence does an effective job at deterring them enough during daylight hours so that's why I let my birds out mid-morning to their free-ranging area.
In the evening before dark, we lock our poultry up into their fox proof pen, which is still a large area but small enough to be manageable. This used to be good enough (for about 6 years) until snakes, crows, and large lizards found it.
That's where the enclosed run comes into play - my theory is the enclosed run coming off the hen house with a small automatic chicken door opening at around 9am each day will be enough to keep the ducks, chickens, and eggs safe because pythons only come out at night (when the run will be locked down) and even if the goannas find their way through the open automatic chicken door during the day it'll only be after 9am and usually I've collected the duck eggs and most chicken eggs by then. In the past, our eggs (mainly duck eggs) usually go missing between sun up and about 7am - ducks tend to lay eggs very early morning or through the night so the wildlife has become used to getting into the pen to collect the eggs before I can (in particular the crows).
Once the run is built, crows won't have the guts to enter a small run doorway and then make it all the way several metres into the chook house to raid the chicken nesting boxes or duck clutches in the ground so that should solve that problem. We'll see!
While I'm at it I'm going to make another duck nesting area at the front of the run because currently the ducks camp and nest under the chickens nesting boxes in the coop so I'm thinking they will enjoy having their own area. If you look very closely at the image below through the coop door on the ground is our mother pekin duck sitting on her nest (the white thing)...
The image below shows how it looks at the moment - So far, I've used two h4 2.4m posts for the door frame at the front (one post was already there as a fence post before the tree fell through it) and have cemented in 4 hardwood logs/posts (cut from fallen trees) with another post to go on the left (near the feed bin) then the rest of the "posts" will be live trees. The cross beams between the posts for the walls will be raw wood but the top roof beams will be commercial lengths except for the top beam across the front of the chook house because I do have a perfect log long enough and about the right size to use for that.
This image below shows my awful drawing skills
It's pretty self-explanatory if you can be bothered to carefully examine my rough sketch and notes... The mess in the front of the pen are some old logs used as a anti-dig barrier from before the large gum tree crushed the fence and there's still some of this gum tree left to cut up. It's all a bit of a mess at the moment but I hope to tidy it up and complete the build of the run by Thursday this week.
