Portage River Farm

With the coop only partially built and surrounded by a fence that was far from complete, the day had come when we needed to bring the chickens back to our farm. They had been under the care of my brother-in-law for the past month but had begun dying in the last few days of their stay. What was killing them was a bit of a mystery but I believe it was caused by the fact that they were closed up in a small space for too long.

The priority for the day was to get the fence in place to keep the chickens in and predators out. This proved to be a massive task for a number of reasons including the fact that I decided to enclose a very large area of over 6,000 square feet around the coop for their use. I wanted to dedicate this much space to them to set up a pasturing system where I could give them adequate foraging room while restricting their access to sections of it to allow the plant life to recover between uses. We'll see if this idea works but my intention is to avoid the conditions of other chicken yards that are quickly reduced to bare dirt and mud.

The most miserable part of the fencing job was digging a trench to enclose the lower 1 1/2 feet of the fencing. The idea behind this is to discourage predators who might be tempted to dig their way to a chicken dinner. Our extension agent had warned me that chickens were little more than "meat on a stick" and a big draw for every predator for miles around. I was determined to do all that I could to make sure that the only predators dining on them would be us.

The trenching job was made even worse because of my siting of the coop at the boundary area between the field and the woods. I had chosen this spot for two reasons; the first was that I was loath to give up very much cleared land for the project and the second was that a coop seemed like a good use for the partially treed spot that would have been far more difficult to clear for gardening. It may have been the best use of the area but the decision meant that much of the trenching had to be done with an axe!

I spent much of the day hacking away at this task and intermittently glancing up at the sun to see how quickly the day was passing. I was making steady progress but it was clear that the task was far too big for the time remaining. Inevitably, it fell to Janet to come out and talk some sense into me. After a few minutes of me insisting that I could just keep going, we decided that another plan would have to be developed to provide shelter for the birds until the fence could be completed.

The new direction being plotted, we all drove into our Plan B to get the chickens home on time. Janet headed to the hardware store to pick up an extra roll of chicken wire and some plastic. Meanwhile the children and I began covering half of our coop structure with tarps. We basically turned that half of the coop into a chicken cage.

The chickens were glad to see us when we arrived to transfer them to the van. They crowded around our feet so much that it was difficult to walk without stepping on them. They had grown tremendously and were obviously feathered-in enough to withstand being outdoors. We packed them back in the two brood boxes and made our bumpy way along the dirt roads back to our farm.

As the sun set on our productive weekend, we released the chickens into their new quarters. We set up a heat-lamp, food and water and they settled in without any problems. I was nervous for a couple of days that the fatalities would continue but they seem healthy and happy. They will be even better off when we can complete the fence and let them start foraging for the first time.