Many of you have read this old thread Get your wife some chickens . It is a wealth of information.
Yeah that was from 2016 when @Chikn told me to get my wife some chickens. Iām just now fixing our coop and building a runā¦
Yeah Iāve been dragging my feet a littleā¦
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I finally got the gate post hole dug out yesterday, man what a chore. Took me a few hours to get it done, got the post concreted in, finished right at sunset. Got everything cleaned up around 7:00, and itās raining now so I hope the Quikrete set by now. Since I had to expand the hole to get at the roots, it took three 50lb bags to fill it back up.
My pruning hand saw really come in handy getting those roots out.
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It truly is a chore to set posts and concrete.
I think next time i want a gate which is in my near future im going to go with the t-post hinge instead.
Here is a run with t posts and the wire i useā¦ much easier than framing and setting posts like I did.
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Too many varmints can get through a gate like that.
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Considered a pre-made gate like that, but will probably make my own out of 2x6 and 2x4ās. I did that with my deck gate about 8 years ago, it still looks good.
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Bumping the thread to see how everyoneās winter chickens are doing, for those of us in colder northern hemisphere climates. Unironically the supposedly hardiest breed I have (hatched from shipped eggs) loves to spend time in their coop whereas the other varieties (bred here in Ohio over many generations) are out and about when itās very cold regardless.
Weāre not getting many eggs right now, but thatās expected. Weāve had some really grey, cold weather.
With the snow we havenāt moved any of the movable coops. Weāre debating putting down bedding in the runs and holding until itās warmer.
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I have an elevated rotating composter that becomes a de facto BSF factory between about June and September. A few of my smarter hens figured out they could fly up into it and feast. But I donāt think I would like tending to a full-on operation.
I am in WV. 30 hens giving me 25-30 eggs per day consistantly.
Kalmbach layer feedā¦ also switched up to Layena and Nutrena.
1 coffee can per day of scratch grains.
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Our egg production picked up right around the winter solstice. I wonāt credit the hens being that sensitive to the slight increase in daylight, but who knows? We do use lights in the henhouse. In November and most of December we were getting two dozen a day on average. We couldnāt supply all the customers we had every week, so weād make it Tuesday to two Fridays later then Friday to two Tuesdays later. We averaged. close to three dozen a day for the ten days we were gone for the holidays and have a temporary glut. We could have worse problems.
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i dont use lights in the winter. i let them rest. why i have some leghorns still laying at 6 yrs. old from apr. to nov. only ones laying now are my 6 onyx that i got as chicks last apr. they started laying in sept. i get 6 hen chicks every spring to replace my oldest hens and those keep us in eggs thoughout winter while the older girls stop laying. im getting about 4 eggs average a day right now. going to start hatching my own chics as buying them has gotten too expensive.
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Hereās a secret. I mostly keep the lights on until 8 so I donāt have to collect eggs in the dark.
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Built a mobile chicken coop, to raise pullets docked onto a run, or for free range meat birds or layers.
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You need more ventilation.
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So Iām replanting in my chicken run after finally pulling all of the running bamboo out of it. That was a fun taskā¦12-18ā deep of matted rhizomes.
Anywayā¦the long part of this section runs W-E and is 32ft. The back side is due north and sun shines in that N-S direction for 12ft of the run (southern portion is roof covered). So I have 12āx32ā to play with.
I have 2 trader mulberries (protected by black airpots) already in there a bit from the NW corner and a dust bathing area shaded by a topped white birch in the NE corner.
Things I have that could go in there are 2 american hazelnuts, some aronia seedlings, 4-5 honeyberry plants. 7 hardy kiwi plants (5 female, 2 male), a triple crown blackberry. Maybe some currants as well.
Iām curious how some of you would space this out. I donāt mind having some of it in guilds. These are generally nontoxic plants for chickens that will give them shade and a bonus of some fruit for me and them. So I need some area in there to move around and clean excess poop.
Iād prefer to leave some space on the west side about equal to where that western (left) mulberry is as I clear that section of snow in the winter for them to walk around in on ānice daysā. The pawpaw patch is outside of the run there too so the less competing root pressure the better.
I was thinking about lining up the kiwis on the north fence and having them grow upward and outward toward the south to give them overhanging shade. I figured the hazels should be more up front to supply shading behind them. Thought about putting the haskaps in a 2x2 square and planting the aronias in random spots of clumps of maybe 2-3 in a planting hole.
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Not sure if this will have chickens in it at some point.. but my chickens want nothing alive. They want to girdle all trees, remove all leaves and remove everything down to the roots.
I have been mowing and bagging some for them and dumping about 25 gallons of grass clippings per week which they devour in 1 day.
My chickens are very well fed with Kalmbach and Nutrena as well as scratch and they still want all living life removed.
YMMV but my chickens are beyond destructive.
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Theyāve been in there since 2017. Yeah they are definitely destructive. 
Everything I plant in there is protected. I havenāt had them girdle anything yet, but if itās green they will try to eat it. I had to cage up the bamboo during shoot season as they would eat the soft, tender shoots right to the ground. But yeah, everything I choose to put in there has to be chicken safeā¦the leaves, greens, and the fruits.
Once established I expect the kiwi and hazelnuts to mostly be out of browse reach. The haskaps will be trickier. I have a couple that have been in pots for a few years that are about 3ft high. Those are mostly safe except for any suckering growth.
I toss mowed clippings in there in the warm season too. I used to have a chicken with crop issues so I had to limit how much I threw in there. But since she passed a couple years ago all of the others have no problems eating the cut grass and weeds.
The hardy kiwis really intrigue me, but Iām trying to imagine how it would look in there in a few years. I was thinking 3-5 plants along the north fence (maybe 1-2ft inside of it) and trained upward and then letting the new growth grow out southward toward the sun. But I guess they would be more difficult to grow horizontally along or under the net like grapes would? Would they just all want to grow up and out of the hawk netting? Thatās where Iām a little unsure where and how to plant. I look at it as a vigorous chicken safe vine that provides shade and gives the bonus of some fruitā¦even if it isnāt a commercial like setup. But I want to be able to get in there and not have everything be a congested mess. I have no problem pruning hard whenever it needs it.
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