First Blog. Chicken Coop

Hi there. My name is Jade and this will be my first blog. I have been gardening like crazy lately and a friend gave me the idea of sharing my little hobby farm I have created in the suburbs via a blog. So here I am, and I hope you enjoy and maybe can take a couple of ideas with you at the end.

It all started when we moved to Puckapunyal Military Base start of this year, 2012. Out here there isnt much work so I began channelling my energies into my garden. Because we are only living on pretty much one pay-check now, I knew I wouldn't be able to spend much on it. So I started looking for cheap ways of getting it how I wanted for next to nothing. My first little project was a house for my two chickens. At that stage I had found two little couple day old hens. One was a Silver Spangled Hamburg and the other a little Bantam.  They are so sweet. They never leave each others side. I found a house for them that my cousin gave me for free. All I had to do was transport it from her place to mine which was about an hour and a half away.  Seeing as we have a box trailer I didn't see this as too much of a problem. But unfortunately that was not to be the case. Halfway home it decided to jump out of the trailer onto the free-way. Luckily there were no accidents. Once home and in the place I wanted it, I quickly realised it needed a little work.
Here is what we started with. The bottom piece was what flew out of the trailer :-/

As you can see the top half needed extra support to hold it up so I had to go to the hardware and buy some wood to make a brace for it. This you can see below. I hammered together some wood to make a box. I had the hardware guy measure it for me and cut the wood, so all i would have to do is put it together.

I then covered the other side with some chipboard I salvaged from our old desk that was destroyed in the move and this seemed to do the trick for now. I also hammered together a little ladder for them to walk up when they were able to get into the top half of the coop. I put some flowers in front of the coop to make it look pretty :o)

Next I needed to make a nest box and I did this using a tv I found at the local tip. I carefully unscrewed the tv and pulled out all the insides. i put it back together and then silicone all the gaps. I cut out a false floor and shoved it in the tv. I then screwed it to the side of the coop where I had make a hole.

Also, now that it had started to rain I noticed that water was getting inside the coop so a friend gave me some free metal sheets for the top to stop the rain. They just sit on top and work fine.
So far the only thing I have paid for is the wood to make the square support. This wasn't much.
The pretty flowers I had planted in front of the coop have been eaten by the chickens. So I wouldn't wast my time with planting anything in the area your chickens will be.

I decided that I would need to contain them at night so I found some pool fencing on gumtree for $100.
I have quite a bit left over after installing this. To install it I just dug the holes for the posts and placed them in. I didnt want to cement them for we are renting and I need to be able to take this down and with us when we move onto our next posting. To keep it all in place I screwed some screw's into the joins and this worked well in keeping it all together and sturdy. My mums neighbour gave me some Yuccas which I planted inside their enclosure. I then brought some netting for the top for they started to fly over the fence. I screwed some steaks to the fence and then stapled the net to the steaks. This has worked perfectly for they have not gotten out since.

I then found a couple of battery hens at the local stock feed that need new homes. So I had to increase the size of their house to accomodate them. They were $10 each and were in such bad shape. It was really sad. They had lost most of their feathers and you could tell they had had a bad life up until I got them.

I purchased this house from a local buy/swap/sell site for $100. The roof opens up which is perfect for when I need to collect eggs. 

                    

I brought some cement sheeting to close the top part in, and a green spray can. I then got to work making it look a little nicer. I built a little ladder for them to get in and out also.

When it came to building a nesting box I was a little stumped for I didnt want to spend any more money than I already had. So one day when we were at the tip unloading some rubbish I noticed someone had thrown out two little girls shelves. I thought they would make perfect box's and so i took them home. Using a hack saw I cut out little doorways for them to get in, screwed in a divider and put down some peat straw. Then one of my battery hens started laying. Hooray!

So far I had spent about $300 or so. But that included two houses, bedding, chooks, fencing and plants. Not too bad.