CompostaBlog

Squeezing the most out of the sunlight left!

We got a bit of a late start. Work comes second and the family is first. The babies just had a tough day today… we did have a bit more help than usual though! Remember the girls, my daughter and her friends that talked me into this chaos? While my daughter is in Oregon away at school, one showed up to help!! Yeah! She played with the babies, fetched and towed water, tools, held things, lifted stuff, I had surgery this week on my leg and she was truly appreciated, as I was not much help on some things.

We got one door up, the $1 door from the garage sale. And the lights up for the babies to spend their first night in their new home.

Half chicken coop half garden shed

Mind you, the chicken wire is not up linking the run to the coop and (clearly) the roof is still not on, so there is still a bit of work to do but just getting the walls up, and one door on to get the chicks in a more stable cover (they are still only BABIES after all!) makes us feel like we made real progress today! We slapped on a piece of plywood for a makeshift roof until next week. Not expecting any rain, it feels safe enough!

Sooo… NOW you can see my cool idea to make one half of the building a chicken coop and the OTHER half, a garden shed. I can keep feed and bedding for the chickens, all my shovels, and hand tools hanging on a peg board. I am REALLY getting excited. No more trucking things back and forth from the garage. THIS is starting to look really GOOD! Our little urban homestead is just coming along nicely.

Seating Space Available

Phase One Complete

This is where I sit and take a break in between digging post holes and stapling wire. This was so much fun doing with the girls. Well, at least two of them showed up for the hard work.

Building a chicken coop has proven to be a bit trickier than I had hoped it would be. I suppose I could have skimped on lumber or not sunk the posts so deep and used less cement, blah, blah, but this will last for a very long time. If I ever sell this house, I hope they like chickens.

Where I wanted it build, toward the backof the yard from the house, there is a tree that offers a bit of shade from the harsh afternoon sun. This photo is facing south and slightly west, as you can see, later in the afternoon. So we had to build the chicken coop around the tree a bit. I don’t know why I always seem to have to do things the hard way. But it will look so nice when it is finished. The garden and garden gate are off to the right. I wanted it close so I can put the straw and pine shavings (or whatever I decide to use for litter on the chicken coop floor) into the compost easily. Also, this location is away from anything. There are no houses close, only a large emtpy lot behind, as you can see. My hope is that no one will complain for any reason. I hope to set a good example of how to use chickens in an urban homestead with very little fuss or complaint.