oh Kelly, be very careful in that sun! I learned a VALUABLE lesson 2 weeks ago when I wound up in the hospital with heat stroke :( it comes on really QUICK and it doesnt have to be hot outside... :(
after 2 weeks, I'm still 'recovering' and may not ever be able to handle sun or heat again ...apparently my built in cooling system is now broken :(
stay hydrated!
but glad you chickens will have a safe haven! :oD my pen hasnt been built yet because of the heat stroke :( so I built them a lil mini run for daytime use. gotta get the bigger pen built soon, as these babies are growing really fast!
Fortress coop ... in some ways
1AnjL,
Sweating is supposed to be kinda healthy but I suppose one can lose too much water too fast. I drink lots of fluids daily. I can drop 4 lbs in a day just being in the sun. Lately I'm down to 175 but swing between 178 and 174 ... lost 24 lbs in the last 3 years. I was so close to 200 that I freaked. I'mplanning to be down to 170 by X-mas.
The birds should be a bit warmer this winter and I should have as few as ever. I'm gonna cull all but the Ameraucana and Welsumers in my layer group that are fenced.
Kelly in Moxee
ah, welsummers, can't wait for mine to be laying!
I cant wait for my 1st egg. You guys will be so tired of me and my eggs.
Hey gals,
I'm eggcited as can be to get this old bomb shelter of a hen house completed. I was just talking to my next door neighbor about how solid it is and how it'll withstand 200 mph winds ... he's the one who coined the "bomb shelter" reference. It'll be here forever. What we need are some trees out there or .... a shade shelter. This afternoon the birds are huddled in 2 corners of the field ... the only shady spots in the late afternoons and its 99f degrees or higher. I put several more lag bolts in the siding today. I need to put close to 30 more lag bolts in it to make it perfect but there's no real hurry.
Kelly in Moxee
One thing I can say about where I put our coop is it gets alot of shade. I will take pics of it when it is finished xxxxxxxxxxxxx fingers it is this weekend.
Tia, We're on a farm ... the land where the hen house is sitting was alfalfa field or hops for the last 70 years. There are just no trees out there and none within 200 ft almost. I'll build them a shade panel next ... they deserve and need a bit more comfort. All they have is our garage to the west and one side or the other side of the hen house ... depending on the angle of the sun and time of day. There are some tall weeds that are currently providing a modest amount of shade and the water trickling out of the trough that waters the weeds. No doubt they'd be happier with more shade. The hen house is too hot in the daytime and they avoid it except to lay an egg. I'll plant a couple fast growing Catalpa trees when I find some good seedlings. When I moved here 6 yrs ago ... there were 3 trees worth mentioning + a row of 8 overgrown Atlantic White Cedar ... that are wonderful ... non-the-less. We now have new ... store bought ... 2 beautiful Austrian Pines, 10 Arborvitae, 2 Mugho Pines, 2 Bradford Pear, 1 Alberta Spruce, a few Larch and Poplar that have volunteered + 1 good sized AusTree I planted. I've also hacked to death about 50 Siberian Elm.
Kelly in Moxee
This message was edited Aug 15, 2008 5:58 PM
I sure wish I had shade trees right now! :o( hot here!
I did buy some white birch sticks....hoping they grow in fast!
Kelly, do firs grow over there? Or too dry & hot for them? Course it would take way too many years for them to grow enough to provide any real shade... How do you go about building your shade panel? I would like to give my dogs another shady area in the yard where there is actually grass - all be it brown now - for them to lie in. Under the trees has no real grass, mostly leaves, needles, rocks & sticker weeds or some type of ivy....
Cheryl ~ Pea
Cheryl,
I try to do things simple ... KISS is my anthem. I'll bury 2 poles (8 ft poles) .... 8 to 10 ft apart. I'll attach 2-3 .... 2X4's at the bottom and top and line it with wood or galvanized steel sheets. This would be a fence initially by adding 2 more poles ..... 8 to 10 ft directly east or west .... they'd get more shade. I'd do only a roof section from the top of the fence to the 2nd set of poles ... using 2X4's at the top only and covering the space over the top with wood or galvanized steel sheets.
Kelly in Moxee
I wondered if maybe you could set up about 3 2x4s at a 45* angle and mount metal to that so that about 18" was open at top and bottom -a kind of lean-to effect?
grownut,
I think a lean-to would be equally fine. I like the vertical option personally here ... because I can mess with it more... leaving an me with an easy ability of adding to it or changing it into a shed or stall for sheep, goats or mini horses.
Kelly in moxee
I think all my ideas are tailored to peeking...though certainly planning for the next critters you get makes a difference.
I'm short enough that anything I could see into wouldn't be good for shade: )
This message was edited Aug 16, 2008 7:19 PM
Thanks! Great ideas I will be 'adding to my future plans'. Hope ya don't mind. I love & try to live by the KISS theory AND recycle materials already laying around ~ hence most of my projects can look very 'redneck'.... Some don't turn out too bad though. Luck there, I think.
Grownut, there with ya, short here too at 5'1" if I am lucky enough to really be the 1". lol I've learned to climb to see things, when needed......lol
Beat 'ya by a 1/2" at my prime -Woohoo!
raspberries at ya! lol. I make do.... climb, jump or whatever - I refuse to be too old!
Didn't get very far on any of my work today, way to hot. Tomorrow suppose to be cooler, about 85 ........ maybe.
I envy Kelly, who can work out in this heat! I sure can't take it at all.
Me neither. Got heat exhaustion once and now I stay in between 11 and 4. We've had a ridiculously cool but dry summer. In the low 80's all of Aug, no rain since mid July (to speak of, anyway) Nuts.
I have learned which shelves at the grocery store I can climb and when to beg from tall people. lol.
lol, I am not much taller than sis :o(
so when I go shopping... I take my 'pet ladder' with me :o)
that would be my step son....who is 6'10 and still growing! lolol!
Here he is goofing off with one of the haloween wigs! lol!
too bad you're not closer - He looks handy! If somewhat conflicted. lol
roflmbo! yea he gets a bit 'wacky' at times :o) he's going to school to become a policeman like his grad daddy was.... I sure wouldnt want to be a criminal and come face to face with him in a dark alley! lol! he only weighs about 255 lbs :oD NOT someone you'd want to mess with ! lol!
but he sure comes in handy when we go to those warehouse stores :o)
HEAT ... did anyone go out of doors yesterday (in the Western states) ? My heck it was a burner yesterday. I had to take a east drive to Idaho for business but on the way my DW got to stop for a few pit-stops at restaurants and antique stores. We saw 85 degrees at the top of the pass near LaGrande, OR. In between there and Baker ... temps were up to 107f then cooled off as we went through the next pass. On the way home is was about 5:00 p.m around Pendleton, OR and still 107f degrees. We've had a few days of this lately in Moxee but 6-7 degrees closer to 100f. At least the air conditioner can be used if needed. We have this glorious cement slab former barn - now a house (imagine sitting on an ice cube) . Yesterday was the 1st time the air conditioner has been turned on this year. My incredible heat report for the year. This is late hot for the area. But its awesome to see and enjoy especially when you have a swimming pool (we don't yet). My ducks have their pond and that's it for the present.
Kelly in Moxee
OMG Kelly, there is no way I could handle that heat. And this is the first time you have turned on AC? You must be made for this weather. I have to do all my work in the a.m. before it gets too hot, then inside or in shade when in the 80's. I get heat stroke too easily. Ever since the 1st time I got a bad case of heat stroke in my early teens, I have had to 'hide' from the sun. I don't know how you can possible work in this weather at all. More power to you!
Cheryl ~ Pea
well, DH just finished installing central AC for me this weekend...just in time for it to cool off outside! I dont envy your heat wave at all, but glad we are now prepared if it heads our way again!
stay hydrated!
1AnjL & Cheryl, I can hardly wait for our year round "semi-covered" swimming pool with adjacent hot tub-spa and sauna to be completed ... when hell freezes over at this rate LOL. We started digging the hole 3 yrs ago but filled it in this summer. When we get a pergola attached to my son's carriage house (future pool - bath house) we'll be doing well to get into the pergola or so by year's end. I have some hop field poles here to work with for a frame. All we need are a dozen 1 foot long lag bolts to tie them together and 20 or so ... 4 ft rods of "re-bar" to keep the framing poles in place. I'll have to elevate them with stones so to avoid rot. We have plenty large boulders/stones for elevating the framing ... which make for a crude but extremely long lived foundation. The poles are 6 inch spun and about 20-25 ft long former trees. They make great frames and are free ... (I just love free). We're building a deck about 20 ft X 20 ft or 20X 25 ft attached to his room for the hot tub about 78 inches closer to the ground.
Kelly in Moxee
This message was edited Aug 19, 2008 4:03 PM
and when it is finished we can have a chicken fiesta gathering at your place?
TF,
Any time you're in the state ... stop in please. Next year things will be improving here. We'll finally get drinkable water for the kitchen and washrooms ... not the high iron yellow sulphur smelling stuff that's been coming out of the tap for the last 6 years. This well is awesome ... watering the lawn... but who out there wants to take a bath in yellow water? We'll add a 1hp pump to this well in my closet and use it for the 3-5 acre compound that surrounds the house. The odd thing is the only well we have on the property now is in a large closet accessed from the room where I have my office. A new well for the culinary water will be 200 ft deeper and clean and clear and 200 ft from the house out in the middle of the compound in a specially built well water house ... built to CODE specs. A well inside the house ... is NOW totally against code. This house cannot be sold using normal bank loans due to at least 2 major code violations that happened during construction or that have developed over the last 50 years. Its a thrill to live here BUTT..........
Kelly in Moxee
This message was edited Aug 20, 2008 10:24 AM
yippee! i wanna move to washington state!
We REALLY need to get that chicken caravan going -just imagine the possibilities!! lol
yes we do.......state to state singing and peddling chickens.
Gloryoryory. Visualize if you will - The Beverly Hillbillies got nothin' on us!!
NOW wait a minute I aint being granny in the chair with the shot gun............
Tia,
Norman isn't even close to the Ozarks ... right? My B-in-L is a graduate of UofO Med School and got his BS at Okla St U. He comes across as a bit conservative and kind-of a hayseed but that's about it. How's that ... medical doctor and a hayseed. He's from Kansas originally which I think is why he is so countrified ... just went to college in Stillwater @ OK St. and then UofO @ Norman ... but really he was in Okla City because of the Med School. There's a brand new medical college here that just opened up a week ago just 4 miles on the other side of Moxee ... on the edge of Yakima but inside the Moxee - Terrace Heights incorporated boundary. My B-in-L takes off from work one week in the summer to ride around inside a wheat combine at his cousin's farm near Wichita, KS. They also shoot crows there for fun of it ... imagine the fun it must be to shoot crows ... cringe. I shouldn't make fun since I shoot ducks ... but then shooting ducks is a stereotypical game type target. I'd never heard of crow shooting as a sporting activity till last summer when he mentioned it. I learn something every day.
Kelly in Moxee
he is welcome here anyday to come shoot crows for fun and I would even feed them. The shooters not the crows. Maybe 5 hrs at most from the Ozarks.
Tia,
That's fairly close to the Ozarks. I'd a never thunk it. I had a client a few years ago who was Dolly Parton's ... S-in-L. My B-in-L is a great guy ... really folksy and normal. He gets real excited about politics and religion ... which I have zero interest in discussing. He has a kinda bothersome attitude about where he lives being the center of the universe. My sister is even worse about it .... yak, yak, yak. They're 95 miles away from where I live and there town is so much nicer than here ... give me a break .... PULEEEZE. Being ethnocentric .... its a boorish personality trait. Where I live is fine .... but there are thousands of places every bit as pleasant. I despise large metropolitan areas. That's about as far as I'll say anything. I am convinced that quality of life diminishes in direct proportion to population density. I think I know about population as well as anyone around.
Kelly in Moxee
Tia- I think there would be waay too many of us to stick that closely to the script. I was picturing more along the lines of 15 or so women and 2-3 men perched all over the airstream and truck or whatever, with chicken under one arm and bucket or shotgun in the other. -Bockbockbocking our way across the country, singing.
City fokes don't know culcher wennit slaps 'em upside the head! We'd brang culcher by the bucketload!!
grownut, I've had some great past few weeks getting back to working on my Fortress Hen House. This morning I'll be buying 100 more 2 inch lag bolts with hex heads and washers to go with them. The roof of the Dynamite Shelter ... "the new moniker" is still fastened by just nails. While there's still warm days remaining in the fall .... I'll be fastening the roof panels to the sheathing and framework below. I have to get the grinder out there & drag an extension cord out there because the door doesn't close well (metal scrapes the door frame).
The remainder of the lag bolts will be used on the NEW roof being attached to our sons Carriage House (...aka outdoor bedroom). His place is finished on the outside for now. There are still corner and ceiling trim to be cut and put in place on the inside. But for all intents ... his little building is finished on the exterior. The new roof being attached is 12 ft wide and 22 ft long with a 1 ft slop in 12 ft. I expect it'll be close to 250 sq ft roof covering a flagstone patio. We're using the same galvanized corrugated steel panels that are 12 ft long and 2 ft wide (+ 2 more inches for overlapping). From this we're intending to add a matching 600 sq ft deck from the west side (roughly 30X20). The roof extension will face south toward the creek and cover the flagstone patio. We intend to have the hot-tub on the deck to the west. We're planning to have pergola(s) attached next year extending to east and if we can think of another location ... we'll have one there as well.
Kelly in Moxee
This message was edited Sep 7, 2008 1:30 AM
Sounds like an amazing project! I have been looking into hops vines again recently for summer shade and your pergola made me think of them -12' of growth in one year so the advertising goes. Can't remember what kind of weather you have where you are, was it the high-plains-winters part of Washington or the coastal-Japan-current part? I would love to extend our outdoor living space here as I am very susceptible to heat exhaustion. Have thought about mosses and other organic floorings which would be okay with a pergola and a shady covering that grows as it gets hot then dies back in winter would be great (yup, my hops vines again)
How were you planning to vent Ol' Dynamite again?(sorry I scanned but the thread is longer than my attention span..;-)
grownut,
We don't vent thus far other than the screen door. Venting is probably a bit critical in the summer during the daytime for the layers ... ONLY. Once I get electricity out there I could put in a fan but it would provide very little benefit. The rest of the year venting is not helpful. My long term goal is get rid of the layers and allow the Game Fowl & the Guinea Fowl to be in there at night. The Game Fowl and Guinea Fowl lay eggs in other remote nest locations but my hen house would be a terrific winter and summer night time shelter. I'm eventually going to eliminate access to my farm implement shed where many roost now ... we'll be adding garage doors. The poultry will have few to no options at that time but to nest in the hen house or move next door.
Kelly in Moxee
I thought ventilation was important no only in temperature regulation but also in reducing stress and lessening the concentration of dust, ammonia gas and disease-causing organisms?
catscan,
The screen door is more than 1/3rd the size of an entire wall roughly 2.5 ft by 4 ft. It fills the need of a window and a door. That is all the ventilation needed for reducing dust, ammonia gas and any bacterium that might be present due to humidity. The building is bone dry on the floor so the chickens really are not imperiled by what some might ordinarily have in different settings. Realize too that our region gets 10 inches or less of annual precipitation ... probably 1/3rd to 1/6th the amount of rainfall that 90% of the DG members get in other parts of the US. Daytime heat during the hottest stretch of the summer is the only issue for the present and once my layers are gone .... the issue (thankfully) goes too.
Kelly in Moxee