The best ever pasture chicken waterer!

We have tried them all! name it, we have used it... chicken waters come in a variety of shapes, sizes and styles. But finally, we have found one that we truly love!

The brilliant things about these waterers are :

enclosed float under the bucket, out o reach
Easy open top to refill
large size
no need to carry to refill
water inside stays clean

Basically there is a float system under the bucket that lets water flow slowly into the lower ring. It is so enclosed that it doesnt get dirty, plugged, or changed by tiny feet, beaks, etc.  There is no vacuum system to maintain with special rings, seals, etc.  This unit just works!

We buy them from teh local Big R Stores, and have converted all our coops over this year. There is a similiar waterer on amazon and other sites with the same design but only 5 gallons of capacity. This one holds 6.25 gallons.

Fire update : rebuilding begins

There is one sure thing after each tragedy in life....  Life goes on.  You pick up the pieces and move on.  That's exactly what we are doing after the coop fire we suffered  a couple weeks ago.

The first set of replacement chicks hatched the week of the fire,  many of them donated back to the farm by those who had ordered chicks before.  We really appreciated the generosity....  But also faced a problem....  We have no brooder up move them to!  In fact, the chicks are already old enough to escape the water troughs we put them in for their first night or two and we are finding chicks roaming  our home!

Welcome the farm master builder (also known as our part time farm hand and delivery route driver)  Bradley!  Monday during our regular farm meeting we expressed or desire to have a new approach to brooders,  something movable yet more appropriate than hoop houses. During our chat of options, Tiffany pulled up a picture of a brooder she found on her Internet phone.  We agree that it is a suitable design.  This commissioned,  Bradley springs into action .

No plans,  No list of materials,  No help, nothing but a single picture.  Yet the next morning Bradley shows up with the materials to begin. Three days later there sits not one but two brooders, each 8x8 with a hinged top. And they even look almost exactly like the picture (with a couple improvements).

Ironically the new brooders sit in the now bare ground of the old coop,  a few burnt remains still standing.  A chilling reminder of what was.

This post will be followed by another post on the brooder design complete with pictures.  I wanted first to offer the story of how it was built,  and express or appreciation to everyone involved..  Those who donated chicks, Tiffany for finding a good design,  Bradley for spending a couple days building this masterpiece from only a picture,  and you for all the kind words of condolence,  comfort,  and encouragement.

Army training camp, or little sprouts chickens?

Great shot of the four pasture laying coops glowing on an early winter morning....  Oddly reminds me of a scene from M. A. S. H.   But no..  Those arent army tents.  They are just chickens hard at work feeding you fresh eggs everyday :)

Solar Powered Self-Propelled Turkey / Hen Coops are operational!

Yesterday we hit a milestone!  Finally, after months of delay, we re-activated the fist of our solar powered self -propelled turkey / hen coops. If you recall form a previous post, the last design worked ok except we struggled with the anchor point (ground would be too hard in the summer)  and the constant extreme tension was pulling the winches and lumbar apart.  This latest design solves both problems!

fist, we created the coop anchor. This is a 1000 lb block of concrete encased in old tires (recycling!)  with rebar hooks for moving and attaching the coop winches to.  At 1000 lbs, the anchor is heavy enough to outweight the coops themselves so we no longer have to drive a series of stakes in the hard ground.  We simply use the tractor to pick up the anchor by hooking the tractor forks through the top rebar loop, move it, and set it down.  The coop winch cable connects to the anchor easily, and  presto,  a self-propelled coop. The anchors cost about $50 in concrete and rebar... the tires are of course free.

The winch anchor in place. notice the cable form the lower front  loop. 

here is a shot of the extended cable. this is the stock cable, about 75 feet long. We can add a 150ft cable  to allow for less labor. 

The second problem,  constant tension, took more thought.  The winches are auto-braking type, meaning once the run to a point they brake there and hold tension indefinitely. most cheap winches do this. The only way to remove tension is the revers the winch slightly after running it to pull the coop. But how to do this without adding yet another timer?

Where there is a will, and some creativity, there is a way! I ran across an unorthodox idea.... using a large capacitor  as an inline timer circuit. I say unorthodox because technically, this use is bad for the capacitor and cuts its life. We'll see how much that is.  I dont think it will be significant.

I built a simple inline RC circuit to reverse the winch any time it was operated, just enough to release tension.  The inch itself has a relay drive. you connect 12v to one relay and it moves forward, the other and it moves backward.  My timer output is a relay contact also, with both positions (NO and NC). TO make this work, we connect the common of the timer relay to 12V, the NO contact to the forward winch relay, and the NC contact to the inline timer circuit, The timer circuit is just a capacitor (about 4000mfd) in parallel with 500 ohm resistor.  This goes inline with the winch control wire for reverse.

How does this work?

When the hourly timer triggers calling for a coop move on schedule,  this triggers the winch timer. The winch timer energizes its internal timer relay giving 12V to the winch control relay. The winch moves forward pulling the coop. the timer goes for about 5 to 10 seconds and moves the coop 1 to 3 feet.

In the reverse timer circuit ( the capacitor and resistor), there is now no voltage applied to the circuit since it was connected to the NC contacts of the timer relay. Therefore, any charge within the capacitor bleeds off through the resistor.

When the timer stops, the timer relay de-energizes. This removes 12V from the forward winch relay and the coop stops moving.  At the same time, the NC contacts of the timer relay close again, providing 12V to the top of the reverse timer circuit. Since the capacitor is discharged, it immediately charges to 12V. This energizes the reverse winch relay for about 3 seconds. Once the capacitor is charged, the current stops flowing and the reverse winch relay stops.

So, as long as the winch runs for long enough to discharge the capacitor, the end result is forward movement followed by a removal of all tension from the winch cable.  This repeats each time the schedule timer runs. (a further improvement would be to adjust the resistor size so that the trickle current in between winch run times is minimized to save power. )

So there you have it... a solar powered, self propelled turkey / hen coop  that can house up to 100 chickens, complete with nesting box, or 50 turkeys. They live on real ground, have safety from predators, self contained water and feeder, roll away nesting box for clean eggs, and get fresh green grass hourly. All we do is fill the water, feed, and collect eggs, then every 3 to 4 days move the winch anchor with the tractor.

here is the winch, ready for action. the small box on the left is the winch relay box. 

The electronics hiding under the solar panel. Before rain comes I'll need to enclose this is some sort of plastic box.  you can see the battery, the solar charger, with two timers mounted on top. Wires could use some tidying up. 

here is a shot of the electronics. The schedule timer, with up to 20 set times per day to activate. Above that is the winch run timer. the white circle control sets how long the winch runs per activation and thereby how far the coop moves. at the top right is the reverse timer circuit. I used 2 capacitors because we didn't have one single large enough. 

the electronics and solar panel ride alongside the coop on a pallet mounted on skids. the pallet is  hooked to the coop by a small chain and hook. before wind hits, i'll need to mount he solar panel to the pallet more securely. 

So there it is, almost perfect! Just a few finishing touches and.. well.. build 6 more !

Coop anchor

We finished our first test design of a moving coop anchor. If our math is right this should weigh 1000 to 1100 lbs. That's just enough to serve as an anchor for our self propelled solar coops and yet easily moved by the tractor.

It consists of 3 old tires, rebar, and lots of concrete. Total cost about $50. There is a carry hoop on the top nice and wide so the tractor forks can easily catch and pick this up to move. There are also rebar hooks on each side, between the lowest and next tire. These serve as the place to attach the hook from the winch cable. 

In theory, we will use the tractor to place the anchor in position where the coops should end up. Then we can attach up to 4 coop winch cables to it and it will allow the winches to pull the coops to itself over the next 3 to 5 days. , then you move it and repeat. 

It will sit until next week to cure, then we will test it.

Nighttime visitor

We have had a nighttime visitor for the last two nights. A very determined if somewhat incapable visitor. He has twice torn open a coop, but failed to capture a single meal from inside.
Our best guess is a juvenile lion (cougar). Perhaps one a bit inexperienced in hunting. The first morning we found a coop with roosters attacked, door half torn and pulled off its hinges. The door is 1/4 inch plywood. No damage to the chicken wire across the front. The roosters were let out but all accounted for and no feathers found.
Sedond night he returned, broke the door in half, pulled the hinges out completely, and broke the 2x4 that held the hinges. No damage to the wire and no roosters lost. There's is but one little pile of maybe 8 feathers.
So we decided to work with the county trapper to set a large live trap. Quite large, big enough to walk in. Whatever this is will likely return as it is hungry and repetitive. As the sun dawn we will head out to see if this was successful.
Cougar? Bear? We will soon see....

Eggs, eggs and more eggs!

An egg!  We found the very first egg in the new chicken flock!  Amazing on two counts... we haven't lighted these chickens yet, so the first eggs are laid in January without artificial light. And... it was found in the rooster coop!
Obviously while separating hens and roosters someone got misplaced ;) It is difficult to tell gender at this age sometimes. 
But.... this means we will have more than double the number of eggs for sale really soon! That great news for everyone waiting to partake in Little Sprouts eggs.
As a reminder... why are these eggs so special? Because they have everything in an egg that is desirable, not just one aspect, they have it all:
Truly Pastured
Soy free
Certified Non GMO
Organically raised
Antibiotic free
Hormone free
Omega 3 rich
Heritage breed
Fertilized (will be by sales time)
Unwashed or washed (your preference)
Farm fresh
Why are eggs so important? A well produced raw egg is the basis of most healing diets. The pastured fresh raw egg yolk is a miracle food, a powerhouse of healing and nutrition. Many healing diets encourage as many pastured raw egg yolks per day as practical. The egg, when done right, is just about the most perfect food. Just be VERY careful never to overdo storebought eggs. They are not the same thing in a number of ways and are in fact often quite dangerous to eat.
So this one little eggs is happy news! We have been waiting to have a larger supply so that we can start pickling eggs again. Looks like by Feb. this will be possible! Yummy pickled eggs are coming back!

Getting ready for winter breeding

Lots of changes around here this week! Let's recap:
Processed a few more turkeys, all toms not needed for breeding. These toms look excellent! All consistently large with good fat content. We have a few more to go before we retire the processing equipment for the winter. Some turkeys will be available for sale through the winter as frozen.
To facilitate processing we finally put a real shelter over the equipment creating a mostly closed area. Even have a little propane camp heater to warm up by! This makes the experience much more comfortable. I remember three years ago learning how to do this on a card table in the freezing rain. How far we have come!
The turkey numbers are now small enough to fill only one turkey breeder coop. That frees up another coop. We have split the next chicken flock into his and hers living quarters. These chickens were getting much too big to all fit in one! There are 270 or so birds total. Now the hens can mature into laying hens and the boys can fatten up for heritage meat chickens using our soy free broiler chicken ration. These will be our first meat chickens for sale.
We also moved the ducks into the old pig pen. They are easier to protect from predators here, and mostly will stop escaping the pasture and ruining our back yard! Ducks wreck havoc on lawn grass! The smaller area can be lighted so egg production will climb again. Also this area is destined to be next years garden so what the ducks leave behind will be gold to the plants!
Next steps are adding lighting to turkey coop, chicken coop, and duck pen to get egg production going. Also we still need to design some laying boxes for these new pens and get the solar winch rebuilt and working.
Never a dull moment!

Turkeys final stage

This week has been busy! Lots to do at the end of summer. One project we just put to bed is the turkeys. This years thanksgiving birds now have a new home! We finished the three newly designed turkey hoop houses and I must say... I finally like this design! After 3 years and countless revisions... we have turkey coops that work.

The hoop houses are movable easily, have enough floorspace and roosts for about 50 adult birds, huge easily opening doors, quick to build, etc etc. In short... they work. We built 3 to house the 150 or so birds this year. The coops are sitting in the neighbors pasture while we replant ours for winter. There they have access to bugs, grass, and fresh dirt. The coops are moved daily.

The turkeys will stay in the coops for about a week to acclimate them to the new home, then we will let one at a time out for a day. This way they stay close to the coop when out, will be easy to gather at night, but will have plenty of exercise hunting fresh grass and bugs and spreading their wings.  The somewhat limited activity will help to build fat without compromising health.

So... we are in the home stretch!  If you visit... look to the right of the long driveway. You will see 3 large hoop houses that look a little like army barracks. You will also notice a line behind the coops of eaten, trampled, and heavily fertilized grass.  Come by around noon and watch the coops pulled to fresh grass everyday.

Thanksgiving is just around the corner and we only have a few birds left. If you wish the best thanksgiving turkey ever.... be sure to reserve yours before we sell out!