Archive for NEEPS North East Eco-friendly People's Site          NEEPS Forum Index -> Gardening Sassinak Chickens I have discovered the golden rule regarding chickens and mulch - don't bother, just sprinkle it all over the lawn it will save them a lot of work grrr The same goes for earth in newly dug beds. Why can't they scratch inwards? Why do they have to empty it all onto the grass? I didn't think I would do it. But next week is build a giant chicken pen week   I am going to fence in the area below the house and above the garden. It's 36ft x 54ft so a good sized area for them and I think I can probably still class them as free range    We are going to do it in 6ft x 6ft panels so that the panels can be moved around should I find somewhere better to put them once the landscaping is done. Wish me luck   JoH Re: Chickens Sassinak wrote: I have discovered the golden rule regarding chickens and mulch - don't bother, just sprinkle it all over the lawn it will save them a lot of work grrr       Join the club fencing is the way to go for sure, if you want to grow your own stuff... Smooth Hound ive been tinking about this myself, do you fence the chickens or the veg, ive decided on the chickens, as long as theyve got room to roam a bit JamesB chicken fodder I liked the idea in the permaculture book of making a circle round the chicken house and fencing into 10 segments, you plant fodder crops for the chickens eg lupins, fat hen, broom etc. you let the chickens into a segment at a time for say 6 weeks and keep the rotation going, that way they can harvest the food for themselves! Im hoping to try this, anyone tried fodder crops for chickens? James Sassinak You'd be looking at a huge area and a lot of expensive fencing. Possibly practical if you have a few hens but I wouldn't like to try it with a largish flock JoH mmm yes, and even if wing clipped, one would find its way into an unauthorised segment and then the rest would not rest until they were in there too....   (2 segment here - turn about resting the grass - but in our case, the grass really is greener on the other side..) baldowrie what fencing the area off with some poultry netting and a solar charged zapper? IainC JoH wrote: mmm yes, and even if wing clipped, one would find its way into an unauthorised segment and then the rest would not rest until they were in there too....   (2 segment here - turn about resting the grass - but in our case, the grass really is greener on the other side..) Roof the cages with netting as well to stop them getting out... would save the messing about with clipping wings, etc, also would stop the larger wild birds coming in to nick some food too lachlanandmarcus Im just about to do the same with our chooks, with me its more the sliding on poop on paths and being tripped up by them the whole time! Have got the electric netting but not convinced its high enough even with wing clip so will prob try to rig up a net roof as well. The enclosure is made using 50m of poultry electric net and its moveable so can change the ground that way. The house has wheels too. Dont feel bad, as long as they have fresh ground regularly and lots of space not just an arc then they are as happy as larry. Sassinak Last year they were great - they just scarified the lawn for me which was a big help lol But I suppose I wasn't doing much in the garden last year because of the house and so not much digging going on. If only you could explain to them - over an acre of grass to scratch at as long as you leave the digging to me pete_inthehills Re: chicken fodder JamesB wrote: fodder crops for the chickens eg lupins I thought lupin seeds were poisonous?   Wiki is off its head - this is a direct quote about lupins "are widely cultivated for livestock and poultry feed. Both sweet and bitter lupins in feed can cause livestock poisoning" are they poisonous or not? pete inthehills Sassinak I've searched and come up with this "A number of the species are cultivated only as ornamental plants, but others are grown for fodder, and if not over-fed, are found highly nutritive and wholesome. If the seeds of certain species are eaten in a more or less mature condition, poisoning is liable to occur, great numbers of animals sometimes being affected. These poisoning accidents have occurred in Europe and in the United States." Source here if anyone wants to read it in full http://www.botanical.com/botanical/mgmh/l/lupins50.html This article is very interesting and goes into it in greater depth http://lupins-bk.blogspot.com/200...story-of-lupin-domestication.html Smooth Hound yes the farmer here grew some last yr, i actually thought it was for green manuring/fixing nitrogen, but obviously theres more to this than meets the eye zombiecazz Fence in chickens. If you fence in the food they will always find a way in!!! JoH IainC wrote: JoH wrote: mmm yes, and even if wing clipped, one would find its way into an unauthorised segment and then the rest would not rest until they were in there too....   (2 segment here - turn about resting the grass - but in our case, the grass really is greener on the other side..) Roof the cages with netting as well to stop them getting out... would save the messing about with clipping wings, etc, also would stop the larger wild birds coming in to nick some food too Have you ever tried to roof half an acre?????? Their night 'pen' is roofed with wire and then their inside bit is concrete anyway but outside...not a chance in hell   Sassinak I did wonder how we would go on if the dreaded bird flu arrived because birds were only going to be allowed outside in pens with a solid roof to stop the droppings of wild birds contaminating them. Any sort of plastic sheeting on a roof here would last about a week, if that !! JamesB thanks for the lupin links. It seems it can be poisonous in larger quantities and the modern lupin breeds are more suitable. I wouldn't grow it as a monocrop for the chickens but along side others here some more suggestions, a lot of which are perennials bamboo,shepherds purse,sedge, fat hen, good king henry,broom,gorse,plantain, new zealand spinach in terms of fencing the yes it is a lot more (4 times more than one segment if you have 8 segments and keep the circumference as a mobile fence), I would only roof one segment (whcih I want anyhow so we can leave them overnight during the summer without shutting them in) we only intend keeping 3 chickens again since that was plenty for our needs so the area required is not so large. you can also grow human food crops like peas up the fences (obviousy harvesting before the chickens are allowed in!) i might start off with a few segments and see how it goes but just think if you could grow the majority of the food for the chickens it would be great ours were completely free range before but thats not possible now we have a garden established. 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