When the purpose changes, sometimes modifications must be made.
A long, long time ago in steemit history, I began working on some prototypes. The goal was to have access to the fresh grass for our rabbits. These were a form of rabbit tractor, and they worked very well for us.
Here you can see an ancient photo I pulled out of the steemit archives, the original purpose in the design was for them to house rabbits.
However, even back then, we began to keep chickens in the units that we had designed to be used for rabbits. Though a lot of the design would be the same for me, one key difference exists, and that is what I was finally fixing yesterday.
A QUICK VIDEO ON THE ISSUE AND SOLUTION
Here is a quick video that I shot yesterday where I've got the unit tipped up on its side. I did not have a tripod, so I used a small child, which did not help the stabilization of the video, LOL!
I'M FINALLY GONNA FIX IT
To prevent the rabbits from digging their way out of these houses, I put a wired metal bottom them. This way, the rabbits would be secure no matter what they tried to do and they would still be able to be on the ground and able to munch on the grasses and plants beneath the tractor. However, this does not work as well with chickens.
The manure (poop) of the chickens sticks to the grasses, and the wire, and eventually can form a bottom. I've been dealing with this for a while now and would usually just hose them off periodically, but a recent rainy season helped a thick mat of manure to form and I decided to take care of it once and for all by just removing the wire.
These were temporary prototypes anyway that we wanted to use and test our while we waited to move down onto our land. We plan on eventually building some nice animal shelter that will be built to last, but these have certainly served their purpose so far and will continue to, I just had to finally modify them.
Once I finally cut off the wire bottom, I had a ton of manure to deal with. Yes, it is chicken poop, but that doesn't mean that it is not useful here on the homestead.
Here you can see that when my hands aren't on the computer board or moving the mouse, I've got plenty else for them to do, LOL. This will make a very nitrogen rich fertilizer for our garden, but first it must be composted. The manure of poultry is considered "hot manure" which should be composted prior to applying to your plants. Failure to compost first can lead to "burning" your plants and may even kill them.
It may not look pretty, but it's useful and I'll use it. It would probably be easier just to chuck it in the woods somewhere, but that is not how we like to do things around here. For us, pretty much everything is useful in someway and we like to think that things like this are just more resources that we've been blessed with.
I reinforced the bottom framing and adjusted a few other things to make sure this unit would still be able to be used for a while. Plus, we will soon be moving it down to our land, which will start even more adventures for us. It is nice to see piece after piece of this puzzle that we call life falling into place.
We also prepared the nesting boxes once again and will soon begin to let some of our hens sit on the eggs. We don't want to hatch out chicks when it is too cold, but we are eager to start raising the next batch too. Soon we'll begin the process once again and then we will have a pile of cute little chicks to deal with!
While the completely open floor may not look spectacular now, it'll be really nice once the grass starts to grow again. It'll be great to have the chickens protected at night, but still on the actual ground, and now, we won't have to worry about manure sticking to the bottom and coming with the tractor when it is moved. Each move will now provide a fresh patch of ground for the chickens to use.
While I was at it, I removed the bottom from the one that we are using for our Muscovy ducks too. Like the other one, this was built for rabbits as well, but life adjusted and now the unit must be adjusted too.
If you look closely in that photo, you can see the wire bottom with the grass coming though it. It truly worked marvelously for the rabbits, but their manure is different from that of the ducks and other poultry.
Here you can see just how much different it truly is. Once again, that wire bottom had to go. This is a duck tractor now, not a rabbit tractor. Thankfully, now I've got even more "resources" since that was a nice pile of poop too!
As always, I'm @papa-pepper and here's the proof:
proof-of-poop-problem
Until next time…
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