Chicks' Play Pen part 1

It was a beautiful day in Raleigh, North Carolina today. The temp was 54 degrees and the sun was shining!

Great day to get a little more done on the City Chicken Cottage. I set the fence and attached it to the post and the bottom of the coop. It looks like this part of the fencing will be very secure, may the rest go so well!

Just a note, took time to total my expenses thus far and was very surprised and happy to see I am coming in under budget!

The journey continues!

City Chicken Coop Safety Net

All the walls of the city chicken coop are up! The front door is still in the planning stages. I am not sure what
I want it to look like and how I want it to function. It will probably be one of the last pieces of this puzzle to be put in!
I have left all the odds and ends still to be completed in the coop for a later date and started working on the "play pen". I have done a lot of research and am probably going a little bit over the top with safety but I have a saying "not on my watch"! Meaning I want to be sure the hens are not only happy but safe!
I am using 1/2 inch by 3 feet by 50 feet hardware cloth for the bottom section of the enclosure. I am burying it 12" deep, well as close to 12" as I can manage! I am not sure if I will leave it at 6' long as shown here or add another 3' as I planned. I am trying not to be cheap at this stage but as the material adds up and the project seems not to want to end it is difficult not to want to take a short cut and save some time and money.
I try to remember that chickens can live a long time and a job well done now will pay off with less headaches latter. I am enjoying the challenge of this project but I can't help think, all of this for 4 chickens?
Perhaps the answer will be to up the number of ladies in the house! Watch out!
The City Chicken Cottage continues to grow!

Front wall of hen house

I was not sure what material I wanted to use for the front of the chicken coop. After a good deal of thought I decided on a rustic look. I chose common wood fencing material to get the look I wanted. It is inexpensive and will not need to be painted. It does leave air leaks but with our North Carolina weather I believe that will be fine. I have read that chickens release a lot of moisture when they breath and need good air circulation in the hen house. The other three walls will be solid so with this "breathability" I will not worry about adding a window. That will be one less place predators may get in. The front will not receive any wind to speak of so rain will not be a problem either. I think it will work out well and I like the look!

The front was completed Nov. 14 2012.

The journey continues!



View from the Top!

Roll out the carpet!

I have done a lot of things in my life either with others or by myself but one of the things I have never done was to install roof shingles. I looked it up on Google and found that it was a fairly straight forward process. BTW what did we do before Google?!

After learning how to do it I started to price the materials. I found that you can not buy just a few feet of the "black velvet" paper, which is not velvet at all! It is sold in large, heavy, expensive rolls, well expensive if you only need a very small amount of the large roll! I also was not sure of how many shingles came in a "package" and how heavy that was! Heavy is important to me at this point of my life!

As it happened I went to "nanny" for Joe at the time I was working on this part of the project. As I approached his house some construction workers were rolling out that most precious "black velvet"!
Learning not to be timid about asking for free stuff I went over and asked if I could perhaps buy 16 feet.
They were most gracious men and gave it to me free! I also learned how many shingles come in a pack, about 26 or 27.

Now with the "black velvet" and shingles in hand I went to the roof top to install my first roof! It went rather well but just as I was about to finish I was short 4 shingles!! Had to run to the store to pick up the extra shingles and finish before the rain began to fall. So for those of you who are taking notes it was 1 package plus 4 shingles to do the job.

The view from my first roof job was beautiful! Tivo, my faithful friend was sunning herself between the clouds and the beauty of a good job done was admired by one, me!

The shingleing of the roof was done in one afternoon on Oct 26, 2012.

The journey continues!

City Chicken Coop Framing





The work on the hen house has been slow but I am savoring the journey. 

For those of you who may be interested in some of the dimensions and other such stuff here it is:

   length: 72"                                                       

   width: 44"

   height from floor: 48" front, 45" back
   height from ground" 18"

The width and length was determined by the plywood I found on sale. It would have been easier in some respects if I had made it 3' x 6' or 4'x 8' but where is the challenge in standard measurements! It is not perfectly square either but my hen's will be happy for a home where they are not considered for the pot of soup on the stove! And in the end "rickrack" will cover any deficiencies the chicken cottage may have.

The top picture was taken Oct 9, 2012 and the bottom Oct 15, 2012.

This City Cottager's journey continues! Yea for that!

Backyard Chickens at the City Cottage



The foundation.



 Where do I begin my tale of the city hen house? With the foundation I guess but in reality it started long before the foundation was set. As I have written I was off and on about doing backyard chickens until this last September. When I was on about the idea I played with many different locations for the hen's cottage. I purchased the 4 concrete blocks long ago and measured and placed them in two or three places trying to imagine how the hens would like the location. Would they get some morning sun? Would they get enough shade in the summer? Would the winter wind give them a chill? And then I got "chicken" and put the idea of backyard chickens to bed and used the cinder blocks for another project. One thing you must know about this city cottager she is never without an outside project!

As it turned out all of my procrastination paid off in finding a good location for the hen house. This site in the picture is located at the back of my lot. I never gave it a thought in my earlier exploits don't know why. It will receive morning sun all year round and shade in summer from the hot afternoon sun. It is close to my new vegtable garden and my compost bins. So on September 9, 2012 the foundation was started! I am on my way to raising some city chickens....well I am on the way of having a coop for some city chickens!

The City Cottager's journey continues!

















City Cottager Goes Chicken!



The City Cottage Backyard



After saying I was going to raise chickens and then getting "chicken" and deciding NOT to raise chickens I am now going to raise chickens! What ever made me think of raising chickens in the first place? I guess it has a lot to do with what I would like my mission in life to be. I strive to live a simple life style because I believe that simplicity brings harmony which brings peace and from peace comes gratitude which brings joy. This becomes a circle of life; simplicity,harmony,peace, gratitude, joy!  I believe the closer we live with nature the more simply we live. Nature is not in a rush and if you listen to Mother Earth you will slow down and enjoy what she has set before us. When I look out into my yard it seems to call for chickens! Chickens are suppose to be easy to care for and a lot of fun. I am not convinced that they are as easy as the books claim after all most of the books are 200 pages of directions on how to take care of your chickens! They cover the size of the coop, how to protect your chickens from predators and what to feed them. There is always a full chapter on illness and diseases that they will probably get over the course of their life which is generally 7 plus years if you don't get fed up and eat them! One book made it very clear that veterinary care for your chickens will be very costly and that poultry diseases are some of the most difficult to diagnose! Yikes! That right there made me think I was trully nuts to think about raising chickens! But the yard still called out!

So after thinking about all the people who are now raising chickens in their backyard I feel this City Cottager should be able to raise a few hens without needing a veterinary degree to get a few eggs and good poop! After all that is all I want; some good poop to add to my compost pile, good eggs to share with family and friends, a live weed eater and the sound of hens clucking. The yard calls out for chickens so chickens it will be!
The journey continues!!