Chicken Diaries Part 2 – The Chick Inn

It’s been 10 weeks since we’ve brought home our (not so) little girls, can you believe it?  Our little fuzzy chicks have grown into the teenager stage already and are getting bigger and changing by the day.

It was time to move them outside because:

A.  they were outgrowing the cage in the spare bedroom we were keeping them in.

and

B.  Momma wanted the smelly chickens out of her house!

I love the way Mr. W designed our coop.

There is a sliding barn door and smaller barn door style window on the front that open into the run.

There is a bar attached to the far right end of the door so we can open and close it from outside the coop.

There is a door under the roosting section of the coop to pull out and dump into the compost bins that are right next to the coop.

There is a set of double doors also to open and close up tight if it’s cold.

However, inside are screen doors that stay latched so we can allow that side air flow during the hot summers and also so we can talk to our girls or let the grand babies see them inside.

There is also a small sliding barn door style window in the back of the coop along with a bin door that opens at the back of the nesting boxes.

This will be great so we can reach in and remove the eggs when they are laid and grab them before a mad mama hen tries to peck us.

The run was a BEAR to paint because of having to get up on a ladder between all those roof slats. According to my hairdresser, I still have white paint on the back of my head.

But it’s finished now complete with a door so we can go in to do whatever. And of course we had to make it cute!

Also the ramp for them to head up or down the stairs has some of the roof shingles on them for traction as you can see.

He also added a swing…but thus far, the dingbats chickens have yet to stop being chicken and get up on it.

The run is attached to the coop and chicken wire goes completely around the bottom of the coop as well to allow some shade and for the food and water to be under. We still need to paint the support under the coop white, but we’ve had life since then…as in a wedding…and Easter Egg Hunt and all of that put things on hold!

At first we just used their chick-sized feeders and waterer, but they were draining those so quickly!  Mr. Wonderful remedied that this past weekend.

He used a 5 gallon bucket and added these watering cups to the bottom.

The chickens have to peck those yellow golf tee looking things to make the water come out.

Can I just say that chickens are not the sharpest tools in the shed? It took them awhile to figure this out.

Then he made this nifty box on the outside.

He attached PVC pipes that allow us to just put the hose into the blue topped one to fill the bucket.

The lid of the box and the inserts help keep water and dirt out.

The other PVC pipes are for feed.

They curve around and up into the run so the chickens can have nice little feeding dishes, and once again, we can fill them from outside the coop!

And once again, we had to throw little pieces of lettuce on top of the feed for them to find them. SILLY CHICKENS!

I love that our coop is ready to go and the girls are happily playing in their run now! I can’t stop praising Mr. Wonderful for his creativity and genius in making us the best coop ever!  The girls were so  happy they turned around and mooned us!