Building the Chicken Coop: Part Three: Rafters and Plywood or "Oh My! Is That Actually Part of a ROOF up There !?!?!?!?

The rafters, once built properly, had to be put up. We decided to leave one wall piece out so we could lift up the rafters from inside the coop. We were hoping it would go smoothly. Well.......not so much. We had to start with the end piece which weighs a ton. The four of us mucked around with that all Saturday morning and couldn't get it up for love, money or chicken feed. I finally had to leave to go get necessities in town, one of them being chicken feed. When I got back, the end piece was up! Turned out that a fellow we knew showed up and basically put it on himself. This guy is as strong as a horse. He used to be a contractor and knew all sorts of little tricks. He suggested Don do a few things before putting up the rest of the rafters. That took up the rest of the week because we got a spat of very rainy weather and that blew a few days. After that, the kids and I put up another wall part which was all good and fine except it was the wrong wall and wasn't put in exactly right. So Don had to waste time fixing our well intentioned mistake. We did manage to hoist the other rafters up onto the coop, they weren't nailed in or anything, but once they were all up, we got the last bit of wall in and our fellow came and hoisted up the other end piece while I took minor heart attacks watching him.

Our 81 year old neighbour came on over to chat with Don Friday night, he offered to help Don put the rafters in place. I wasn't all that thrilled, I didn't want him to get hurt. Well, today he came over and I had a big discussion with him about it. I suggested he just tell us how to do it, 'supervise', as it were, and Don, son and I would do the work. My dear neighbour proceeded to tell me that it wasn't " work for the womens". No, of course not. How could delicate little me be helpful? Hey, I can put up walls, may-be not in the right place, but still, I can get 'em up there. Anyhow, nothing would dissuade him and within 2 hours all the rafters were in place and nailed. Don and I couldn't believe how fast it went. Our neighbour sure showed us that 81 is the new 50 around here. It helps when there is someone around who actually knows what they are doing, there's a lot less discussion on how to do it. Don and I tend to get circular in our discussions on how proceed: "I don't know, what do you think?" "Beats me, what do you think?" And around and around it goes.

Don and son are putting up the plywood on the roof now. Son, aka the spider-monkey, is very adept at scrambling around on a high pitch roof, he has no fear of heights and being a teen-ager, is pretty sure he is never going to die anyway.

With the help of good neighbours and a fearless, agile son it's getting there very s-l-o-w-l-y. Realizing that this might be case of famous last words, I venture to say the chickens should be in by the week-end.

Feathers and All

The little baby chicks are no longer, they are chickens. They're not full grown yet but they are maturing and have left the gawky-oh-my-god-how-can-I-stand-on-these-feet stage. They are at the I-WILL-fly-and-heaven-help-any-human-who-stands-in-my-way stage. They are about seven weeks old now. I turned off the brooder light a while back and I'd say they are ready for the coop. Hopefully the coop will be ready for them soon. The two in the pictures are not the biggest of the bunch, but they were the easiest to catch.

They have three feeders. One standard long one, and a couple of plastic dishes I improvised. I noticed that the chickens higher up on the social ladder would eat first and chase away any lowly wannabe socialite. The ones not eating just kind of stood off a bit, trying to look like they didn't care if they don't get to eat. I found that adding feeders gave everyone a chance to get some food. Mind you, there are a couple of real pieces of work in the crew that are eating at the big feeder and go flying over to the little feeders for no more purpose than to chase away the birds eating there. They don't even seem to realize that while they're chasing the others, they themselves are not eating; definitely not the tightest knit sweaters in the drawer. They kind of remind me of a couple of kids I knew in high school.

The roosters are trying to crow and failing miserably. When I first heard the early attempts, I thought a chicken was choking to death. Now they sound like they have sore throats. I'm sure the hens are laughing at them behind their wings. Everybody roosts from time to time and try to fly. They are have some success with the flying. My son came upstairs and told me there was a chicken siting on top of the brooder. Hhmm, guess it's time to close that in. I have fed them a couple of worms. Now that's funny. I'll drop the worm in and someone will grab it and head out to a secluded corner as fast as his little chicken legs can go. He kind of ducks his head down in the hopes no one will notice he has food. Of course, they always do and chase him. The little chicken scoots along, eating and running at the same time. Then he turns around and shows the chickens his empty beak. The worm doesn't even know what hit it.

As interesting as they are, I'm looking forward to when they are outside, running around and having much more room. They will be happier and so will I.