Homesteading Chicken Coop Build, Chickens, Pond, Garden & Projects

If the birds are laying on the ground up against the fence, do you have roosts for them or a slanted ladder? At night they should prefer through instinct to get up to roost. If it is a blur, do you have a ditch or pond nearby that you would have an otter, mink or weasel?

Man I hope you get it caught, it is so discouraging to lose laying hens after you have raised them and finally are getting eggs from them.

 

I don’t think our weasel problem is big here. Raccoons can be but depends on their population.

 

Meat birds still will roost. It is instinct. Hope they had a safe night.

 

Agreed we have more of a raccoon issue if they are attracted for some other reason.

 

Awe I think I'll keep you too. I mean Dex loves you.

Dexter is my 12 yr old bulldog that HATES people outside of his immediate family.

 

Are those just "worm screw clamps" you used to secure the wire mesh to the frame?

We've retired a greenhouse because the tarp is shot, but the frame is still good, my plan is to take off the lower vertical part and turn the top half circle into a chicken tractor by attaching wire mesh on the ends and covering it with metal roofing, sorry thats the best picture I've got. I think the worm screw idea for attaching the wire mesh to the frame is brilliant, any ideas on how to attach the metal roof?...maybe drill a hole through the frame and use a machine screw with a nut a washer? Obviously that will leak but I don't really care if the tractor roof is completely water proof, its mainly for protection.

 

Cedar slab raised bed veggie garden.

Harvested a bunch of logs, was a challenge as cedars are rarely straight and usually hollow, with a huge taper.


My buddy picked up the logs and brought them to his place to mill. The milling was odd for him as an experienced sawyer as I was most interested in the slab wood and wanted it to be as evenly thick from end to end as possible. This is not the normal way to mill. We leveled the log to the mill, took a 2.5 inch slab, then flipped the log and did the same. The "leftover" plank in the middle ends up with a big taper. I kept the planks too for trail planks over wet spots.





The outside dimensions are 16x16 and the beds are 3 feet wide and 2ish feet tall, the bed in the middle is 6x6, leaves a 2 foot path. The bottom foot of dirt is fill from when the state dug out the ditches along our road, the top foot of dirt is a mix of a tri axle load of loam and some bagged raised bed mix I bought at feed and seed.

 

Looks great, and dog approved.

 

Nice job on the firewood stack as well!

 

Thanks! Now I just need a barn, and a pond, and some goats, and a bigger tractor and a...

You notice my PA Dutch hex on the coop? You can take the boy out of PA but you can't take the PA out of the boy.

 

Looks good as always DaveGunter

The homestead is coming together nicely

 

I like the "log cabin" look of those raised beds

 

Mrs DG is more of a gardner than me, its getting to be not so easy to get back up from being on the ground, so the raised beds were her request and I'm not a big fan of treated lumber for veggie beds.