Chicken House - Inhabited

Our custom chicken house is finished (with the exception of exterior paint to match the house and other out buildings) and the fledged chicks (close to two months old now) reside in and enjoy their new space. The overall structure is 8' X 10'. The chickens have a space that is roughly 8 X 7 and roughly 8 X 3 right inside the exterior door is reserved for feed, egg sorting, etc.

The pullets and what I believe to be two out of 20 that are roosters enjoy the interior with hanging water and feed vessels, a roost and pelletized bedding on the floor which is 3/4 inch rubber mats over the OSB floor which was also painted/sealed with Kilz2 paint. Since the entire structure is primarily 2X4S and OSB, we sealed the majority of the chicken interior prior to moving them in.

This is a view of the structure from the NE corner that shows the door and 2X2 window on the east and the a 2X6 window on the north that provides light and ventilation to the chicken area. The smaller window and door are for the feed area. The siding is preprimed and all the bare wood has also been well primed with Kilz2 and well caulked by Master Caulker, Al.

This is the SW corner. The run will be on the south and obviously you can see the chicken-sized door that will allow us to give access to the yard or deny access to the coop (for cleaning, etc.) as we see fit. The west and south have no windows. Might have been nice for light but more interested in summer heat reduction.

This is just a straight on shot of the south side. Next blog about this will be later this month when we can afford to buy the dog kennel panels that will make the chicken run.

This is the direct shot from the east which is what we see from our kitchen window. The yard which will be to the left of what you see will also be visible so we will get to enjoy the colorful flock from the house and yard. Yet they are far enough away, we should not be smelling them. :-) Knowing how horrible that this blogspot is to manage pictures, hopefully you can look at the pictures and from wherever they land, you can get a feel for how it sits on the property.

Enjoy!

Tribute to Rasberry : January 26, 2000 - April 21, 2010

LaVerne's Rasberry Baret gave up life overnight after 10 great years of service and companionship. This picture is her a couple months ago before she had her last set of twins. Ten years, twenty kids, and ten productive years of milk production are just some of the distinctions this grand old lady takes across the rainbow bridge with her.

She has always been a very special doe to me for many reasons. She was bred by my dear friend in Delta Colorado, LaVerne Charles, and was not bottle raised like the goats we have and therefore not very people friendly. She was definitely a one-man goat. My goat. Even Al would have troubles at time getting her in for milking if she was inclined toward tempermental. And if you asked friends and neighbors who have helped with chores when we were out of town, she was always a handful. But never for me.

She is a cross-bred dairy goat. She is half LaMancha and half Oberhasli. She gets her beautiful bay color with the black trim from the Oberhasli color pallete and both the LaMancha and Oberhasli breeds are enjoyed for their mild mannered personalities.

At age 4, she had many triumphs. She was Grand Champion Recorded Grade dairy goat at an ADGA sanctioned show. The pictures of her being posed are from that show. She did not show again after that year. Later that summer, she contracted a very tough case of mastitis which nearly took her from us then. But with her strong will and the right medications and love, she survived. The triumph of survival was not without its price it resulted in the lost of one half of her udder. But she continued to produce kids and milk right up to the end with her half udder. At the end she was still producing nearly a gallon of milk a day with her one function side.

Today we will give her body back to the earth with her memory firmly planned with us for a lifetime. She leaves behind last year's and this year's doe kids with us and her 3 year old daughter is soon to freshen at a nearby dairy.

May Rasberry rest in peace.

Picking Up Chicks on a Friday Night!

What a strange title for a post on the Matrix Compound. But the woman at the Elbert convenience store gave it to us. Funny how things stick.

We have taken the plunge at the Matrix Compound to get our own chickens again. In Gallup we had chickens, guinneas, ducks, geese and muskovee ducks. But since we have been back in CO we have not ventured into the feathered world.

I more or less took it upon my self to research some cool custom coops that are offered on Craigs List and moved forward with the move to our own eggs once again.

Since our friend, Barry, moved to New Mexico, we have not had the benefit of home grown eggs. So we hope by late summer our newly chosen flock is providing that.

We have 20 chicks (hopefully all pullets) of three varieties. We have 12 Aracaunas, 2 Gold Star and 6 Patridge Rocks. They are resting comfortably in a water tank with heat, feed and water tonight in our outdoor kitchen. We hope to get the coop in the next week or so and move them into it right away.

We have other pictures but this one seems to capture their current environment.

Meet the Goats - Daisy

Daisy (Matrix YB Daisy if anyone is a goat breeder and wants to see her pedigree on adga.org) is a 3 year old purebred LaMancha doe. She is perfect in every attribute of breed character, milk production and temperment. She will not kid this year until around the first of May and we are in the process of drying her off from her last freshening last April. Almost 12 months fresh and still milking strong!

Daisy goes back to many of the goats I started out with in my previous herd under the Drucken-Hanks name with excellent stock from South Fork, Jerita, Altrece, Velvet Acres and others. I have believed in these lines for the past 12 years and they continue to contribute to the strong breeding program of the Matrix herd.

We will try to introduce you to each of our small herd over the next few weeks. If this sounds like a repeat, well it is. I had intentions of doing this last fall but returning to full time work with a busy travel schedule just did not allow. But Al and I both are committed to showing off our critters!

Next on the list--Daisy's 2 year old daughter, Dogoszhi.