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| The chicken tractor on one of my raised beds |
So today was the big day around here. I went over to my friend’s and bought 5 hens off of her. Three (brown) are about 2 years old and two are about 8 months old. GJ hadn’t made the nests boxes until today and when I got the chickens home it posed a bit of a problem because of their size and the size of the nest boxes. They didn’t have a lot of head room in the nest box, which is a rubbermaid clear small tote. So we cut the fronts out of them, leaving an inch or two for the bedding not to spill out, so they could more easily get in and out.
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| Before the nest boxes |
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| After the nest boxes |
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| The not too tall nest box hatch. I think GJ needs to cut the hole about 13″ high and maybe bring it further out from the tractor. |
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| The brown panel lifts out so you can easily clean the roosting area |
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| From the back |
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| With chickens |
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| Access hatches, the left one is a single door that opens and the middle and right are bifold doors, there are 2 locks at the top and 2 at the bottom |
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| The loved scratching the dirt and finding all of the goodies underneath |
So the chicken tractor looks great in all regards, good head clearance under the roosting area so the hens can stay in the shade, GJ build a little roost post for them too in the roosting area. It is just the nest box area that may need to be rejigged. So they were doing a great job at clearing out all of the weeds and critters out of my garden bed. Then GJ came back with the hardware necessary to hang their waterer. One of our guests tried to help by raising it up a bit higher and the whole thing opened up and spilled 3 gallons of water all over the raised bed and the chicken’s feet. So we decided to try out the tractor idea and put the gals back into the transport pen and move the tractor to the next bed. Well it was almost that simple. One hen, who I have named “Sneak” got out and our son and babysitter chased her all over the backyard to get her back to the tractor. So that was fun!
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| We got 3 brown ones, one black one and a buff one (Sneak) |
So after they were settled in their new garden bed they went crazy with the weeds in there. GJ bought some extra galvanized lids when he went to get the galvanized garbage can today to store their feed in. So he took off the handle and drilled a hole in it to make a lid for the feeder. There is no room to put it in the covered area, as I wished, so it is in the open and now it has some protection. Plus the birds like to walk on the lid.
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| The black one is a cross with golden feathers mixed in, her name is Goldie |
We were concerned about predators coming and eating through the chicken wire and chowing down on my birds so we took the old chain link dog pen that was here and set it up around the chicken tractor. It isn’t pretty but it should work.
I did a bit of research and found out that rabbits and chickens can live happily together so I decided to test that theory and I put my black male rabbit, now named Blackie in the pen with the chickens. After we coaxed him out of the roosting area, that is where I first put him, he came down to join the chickens. They gave him a few warning pecks to let him know where he stood in the pecking order and then left him alone. He kept climbing into the nest boxes when
I had him in the roosting area, I have pine shavings in them right now, and I am a little afraid he’ll think they are litter boxes, since he is litter box trained.
I put a golf ball in the nest box to encourage the hens to lay their eggs there. So far no eggs. When I went out to check on them one was sleeping in the nest box and the other four must be under the roosting area, I can’t see them, but I can’t see into the left side because their food dish is in the way. Blackie was happily sitting where the hens put him in his place!
We’ll see tomorrow morning if I have some eggs and where exactly they will be located. Of course tomorrow is Mother’s day and I wanted to sleep in with bacon and eggs breakfast in bed.