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Green Living: How lovely a new topic - shall we talk about chickens as well as tadpoles?

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      CommentAuthorKatymac
    • CommentTimeJun 24th 2008
     
    I have one small white silkie cross she doesn't lay eggs anymore and her sister/friend died about a year ago

    I want some more - but where do I get them from?
  2.  
    Get some ex-battery birds - we have them and they lay very well and adapt brilliantly to a new, free-range life. Try these people: http://www.bhwt.org.uk/
    • CommentAuthorTheDoctor
    • CommentTimeJun 25th 2008
     
    we're getting some soon from a Farm Park.
    lots of odd breeds, and constantly breeding so there are chicks for the kiddies to see.
    therefore lots of surplus hens for sale



    now, i just need an old French car up on bricks to keep them in.....!
    • CommentAuthorludite
    • CommentTimeJun 25th 2008
     
    Agree with Thedoctor. Friends of ours get chickens from a playfarm (because if they didn't they get killed when they loose their cuteness).

    You get a mixed bag of yound birds. The cocks are for the pot - eventually - and the hens are for laying.

    Once we've built the chicken hut we'll be getting the birds off our friend, which means they will be even closer to 'point of lay'.

    Not going for the french car up on bricks though, hubby got hold of a 'chariot'. (looks like the sort of thing ben hur rode). We're going to use the wheels and chassis from that to make a shed on wheels I can drag from place to place.. . . . . . .mmmmm. . . . . can't wait!
    • CommentAuthorTheDoctor
    • CommentTimeJun 25th 2008
     
    like the wheely chariot shed idea

    combined with an easily moved pen (for when they aren't completely free range, the whole garden gets fertilized in a cycle!
    •  
      CommentAuthorKatymac
    • CommentTimeJun 25th 2008
     
    Oh I like that idea

    I'm going to have to re-design the coop if I have more than 3 of them - I have a rabbit huth with a 4ft by 4ft run that we move around - but wheels would make it easier
  7.  
    I think I prefer Gervase's ex battery birds - no neck wringing or plucking involved. You can then let them expire of old age like the silkie's sister (or get careless shutting them in at night).

    I love the chariot too. Build the shed and the portable run the size of a raised bed (say 1.25 m x 4 m together), then let them clear out all the leftovers and pests - eg the peas are all maggoty now, so the chickens could eat the lot and save me the job of pulling them out, turning the soil over and everything.
    • CommentAuthorludite
    • CommentTimeJun 26th 2008
     
    My sister got a bit cross with me last night. She wanted to make me take a load of chicks that her friends mother had hatched out.

    I explained to her (which was rather difficult when her lips go all thin and her eyes started crossing) that little chicks need a light bulb and somewhere warm and dry. They need special food and you can't just leave them in a cardboard box in the kitchen with 2 cats and 2 little kids. . . . . . bloodbath. . . . . . . . Besides, I've already found a supplier who will give me chickens a few months older and much closer to egg laying age (which means I don't have the expense of feeding them until they are the right age)

    Fortunately my lovely hubby took the blame and said it was his fault for not building me a chicken hut when I'd asked him (because he'd been building a treehouse for the kids (adults). . . . . .

    I told hubby that I'd told the forum members he was going to make the chariot into a chicken hut for me. . . . . .he told me to think again, as he had the chariot in mind for a groovy log box. . . . . I might have to resort to feminine wiles. . . . . :wink:
    • CommentAuthorjoe.e
    • CommentTimeJun 26th 2008 edited
     
    A moveable run is a great idea for veg growers - after a crop, you pen the birds in to the area of the bed and let them clean every last slug out before you plant the next lot. Some growers I know have several polytunnels, and the chickens get moved from one to the next between crops. I found an egg in my polytunnel yesterday - my neighbour has some chickens that are very free-range - and I think that rather than fencing off the tunnel I'm going to put wire guards over the seedlings and let the chickens do their thing.
    • CommentAuthorludite
    • CommentTimeJun 26th 2008
     
    Thanks for the info Joe.e. I was going to ask if you could over winter chickens in poly tunnels - or if they would peck their way out. Now I have my answer. Any chance you could answer a few more?

    I gather the plastic cover on a poly tunnel should last 5 years. How do you collect the rainfall off the curved roof? have you tried those 'bubble wrapped' type of tunnel. I've seen them advertised in the back pages of magazines. What's a decent price for one? I seem to remember you recommend 14ftx 30 ft as a god size. Are they hard to put up? Should you orientate them so one of the long sides is presented to the south and the other the north, or should they be E/W sited? Could you put a couple of big rocks in them to absorb heat and act like a thermal store for overnight?

    I fully intend to rotate my chickens like any other 'crop'. I'm just deciding on the best way to fence them in so I can make best use of the plots for growing things in too.

    My Dad used to keep a lot of fowl - geese, chickens, peacocks, golden pheasants, guinea fowl - all of which usually succumbed to the fox sooner or later, so I need to fence areas and keep them reasonably protected during the day and shut them in at night. Now we have badgers too. . . .they don't eat chickens do they? Was wondering about electric fencing as I could move it around. . . .but I've heard the solar powered ones aren't that good.

    Regarding the chickens clearing out the land, I was considering a couple or 3 pigs to do the rotavating , so any fencing would have to be pig proof too.

    Sorry, got carried away. . . . . . . didn't mean to bombard anyone:shamed:
    • CommentAuthorjoe.e
    • CommentTimeJun 26th 2008
     
    The covers will last at least 5 years; it's chafe and contact with metal that does for them, so apply the padded tape really carefully before covering the frame and get the cover really tight. I don't collect the rainfall - it just runs off, so worth considering drainage when siting them. Haven't tried the bubble wrap ones. Easy enough to put up with two or three people to do the covers but doing the ends is a bit of a fiddle. Run them east to west so a long side faces south. The frame doesn't need to be as accurately assembled as the instructions will tell you. Slope the door frames outwards so that the doors swing open easily. Don't worry about the rocks; the ground heats up and stays warm. But you need to watch the temperature - open both doors up in the morning when it's going to be sunny, and shut them both every night. It's useful to make frames that fit the doors with netting stretched over them, to keep birds out when the doors are open, especially if you grow any fruit. And spread landscaping fabric on the ground between the beds if you're not going to cultivate the whole area - the weeds go crazy in there. Top tip: I have a table for seedlings which stands in four little wooden trays full of organic slug pellets.
    •  
      CommentAuthorKatymac
    • CommentTimeJun 26th 2008
     
    Can I feed my chicken rabbit food for a bit - it's flakes and squashed dried peas and stuff?
    • CommentAuthorludite
    • CommentTimeJun 27th 2008
     
    katymac. I thought chickens ate anything (except chicken), especially if it's been soaked. . . . but I could be wrong:sad:
  14.  
    If you build your polytunnel raised up on a wall you can collect rainfall - and then use it to water inside the polytunnel :bigsmile:

    But if you have the polytunnel on the ground, you can plant damp-loving herbs all along the outside eg mints and lemon balm and....(long list...) - so either way you win:bigsmile:
    • CommentAuthorgreenman
    • CommentTimeJul 7th 2008
     
    Sorry if these answers/comments relate to older posts - just catching up...

    Although badgers can be very agressive, they are vegetarian, not omnivores (so no, they don't eat chickens).

    Chickens aren't very choosey about what they eat (they'll clean up most household scraps, particularly if they are cut up first) - I've never heard of them being fed rabbit food though - try it!

    When you ask about 'overwintering' your chickens Ludite, was that on the assumption that they couldn't be left out in cold weather, or just that you wanted some free pest control/soil enrichment?

    Incidentally, chickens are not just good at cleaning up slugs etc, they also clean up the ground, disturbing weeds, and eating their seeds.
    • CommentAuthorjoe.e
    • CommentTimeJul 7th 2008
     
    Posted By: chocolatepixieIf you build your polytunnel raised up on a wall you can collect rainfall - and then use it to water inside the polytunnel

    Have you done this? I'm intrigued as to how it would work.
    • CommentAuthorludite
    • CommentTimeJul 7th 2008
     
    Actually greenman, the majority of my questions relate to 'laziness'. I think it's an overlooked virtue. My reason for overwintering chickens in polytunnels was so they would eat everything back to the dirt - fertilising the soil as they go. I could also tend them in the cold wet months without getting so wet - and without having to get up at first light to let them out of sheds without windows.

    When the time came to start sowing (in the polytunnels, the chooks would have done all the weeding for me), I would turf them back outside (with their portable huts on wheels) to fenced off areas (my outside veggie plots) that would need cleaning and fertilising ready for when the seedlings in my polytunnel needed planting out.

    For the rest of the summer they might be put in an orchard area or a tree nursery area, until it is finally time for them to return to their winter polytunnels. . . . .

    My question about badgers/foxes/rats and such like is how interested they would be in digging under the polytunnel (or ripping their way through the plastic) to get to the chickens. . . .in which case I might have to think again.

    Still no idea how much a decent 30x14 ft polytunnel would cost, and if anyone has got a bubble wrap one - what are they like?
    • CommentAuthorjoe.e
    • CommentTimeJul 7th 2008
     
    I paid £250 for one, but that was from the father out-law, so may not have been market price.
    • CommentAuthorStuartB
    • CommentTimeJul 8th 2008
     
    What happens to your chickens when you go on holiday for a couple of weeks if you don't have neighbours to feed and water them? Can they look after themselves for this length of time?
    • CommentAuthorTheDoctor
    • CommentTimeJul 8th 2008
     
    • CommentAuthorTheDoctor
    • CommentTimeJul 8th 2008
     
    this may not be what you were wanting

    http://www.chickenholidayhillsborough.com/
    • CommentAuthorludite
    • CommentTimeJul 8th 2008
     
    Thanks for the links doctor!
    :bigsmile::bigsmile:
    • CommentAuthorStuartB
    • CommentTimeJul 8th 2008
     
    I don't believe it!! Seen it all now. Would expect it in the US but not Australia!
  24.  
    I totally agree that idleness is an overlooked virtue. Set an idle person a job and it will be done with the minimum wastage of effort. Minimum effort, maximum gain - isn't that efficiency?
    • CommentAuthorludite
    • CommentTimeJul 8th 2008
     
    wheel would never have been invented without someone thinking what a lot of effort pushing things downhill is.:wink:
  26.  
    This is a late addition to this thread, but I laughed out loud when I read that badgers are vegetarian! Most of their diet is worms. And where I live at least, hens.

    Just two nights ago at 11:30 pm, I heard a crashing about in our henhouse. When I opened the lid and shone a torch in, there was a badger, with a hen's head in its mouth. It had only just killed the hen. When I lifted the lid right off, the badger leapt out and ran off ( without the dead hen ), agile as a cat. It was quite small, and very sleek looking, so I guess it was born this year.
    • CommentAuthorludite
    • CommentTimeJul 16th 2008
     
    Thanks for the info about the badger. Worms. It would explain why our 'posh lawn' looks like a polo field after the ponys have finished.
  28.  
    Update!

    After replacing the hen that was eaten, I have been very careful about locking up the hens.

    Not good enough - the badger came back and tore away the door, and got the hens again. :(

    No more hens for me until I have done a major rethink on the hen house construction. Badgers are very strong, determined, smart, and like to eat hens! Grrr.
    • CommentAuthorludite
    • CommentTimeJul 18th 2008
     
    did it eat them all, like a fox would? did it work on it's own or did it have help?

    would love to hear you badger proof construction methods . . . .
  30.  
    It was on its own. It took one hen away ( the broody hen that was taking care of 6 eggs ), and it bit a big enough piece out of the other hen that I had to wring its neck.

    I had built in a little 'maze' at the entrance that I thought the corners were too tight for a fox or badger to get through - but it obviously wasn't a problem. I wasn't relying on just the maze though - I had locked the door. The badger ripped that off.

    Creating badger-proof environment is going to take some thinking through, and some time building, and I have a lot on, so it will have to wait till autumn.

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