As another Lame Cherry exclusive in matter anti matter.
The internet if quite full of summer housing for poultry, which some anal retentive urbanite pinned the stupid name of Chicken Tractor on them. I saw on one Youtube which was really flexible and the Texan was very bright in design, but the problem was it was using livestock panels which are heavy.....not the main problem, are expensive.......a problem, but you have to end up putting light chicken wire on the bottom to keep the birds in, which is the problem as it costs more money and chicken wire in various forms is very expensive in lighter form snags and scratches you every time you get close to it.
So in being moved to construct one for someone with money, the Holy Ghost came up with this design, which I hope to have pictured, but my towers that my camera hook up to have no wifi access and am still transitioning............got the towers blown out of dust yesterday.......one you could have planted a garden in. Too much chit to do.
The basis of this is a light fencing wire of 2 x 4 inches which comes out of Oklahoma, in being a 14 gauge welded wire.
The basics of the CHICKWAGON. Look this is like a Chuckwagon in chuck for the cowboys, so this new defining design in Lame Cherry matter anti matter is called a Chickwagon.
The material list ran about 100 dollars for pressure treated or green lumber. All is 2 x 4 inches though.
Wood list
4 - 2 x 4 - 12 feet
4 - 2 x 4 - 16 feet
1 - 2 x 4 - 8 feet
To explain the wood. The 12 foot boards you need two for the front and back on the floor. The other 2 are cut 4 1/2 feet high in two pieces for the door, and the remaining 3 foot board is how wide your door is. No waste.
The four 16 feet boards are for the sides on the floor, and for the top braces on the sides of the door, making it all stable.
The last 8 foot board is for 45 degree cuts on the corners, of 2 foot long boards each, cut at angle to keep the corners from breaking.
This is all put together with star screws, 3 inches long.
The base frame is assembled 12 by 15 feet, that matches the welded wire which is 5 feet tall.
The wire cost around 80 dollars from a farm store.
The wire is put on with small wire staples. Staple gun would work for rich people.
I used hog rings to clip the wire together at those metal to metal points. that was around 8 bucks for two boxes.
The doors are pressure treated plywood, cut 29 3/8ths inches by 48 inches.
The wire was in 3 fifteen foot pieces, the wire ends trimmed off. The ends I used four pieces of wire cut to size on each side of the plywood door. The top of the ends I simply folded over on top of the wire roof. It is all hidden by the tarp and jagged edges so they do not poke holes in the tarp are dealt with.
That is what the hog rings are for.
The tarp is 12 feet by 16 feet. The 16 feet goes lengthwise and the 12 sideways, as it is important for ventilation.
One caveat in this. I got a brown heavier duty tarp. That gets very hot in the sun. The rethink is to use silver covered tarp to keep it cooler. Shade helps too from trees.
The budget buster in this was the eye bolts, one on each corner that are a 1/2 bolt, the cup hooks to tide down the tarp and the 12 dollar a piece hard rubber metal rim wheels so you can pull this around.
The eye bolts are best to hook the rope too. Use a non stretchy plastic or cable rope as cotton ropes have too much stretch in them.
You will be surprised, if not pulling this in a jungle of grass and weeds, how easy this very large Chickwagon pulls. Yes you can use a garden tractor, a come along, or a pick up if you care, but this moves pretty good with the four tires on it.
I put cross weave plastic twine on top of this tarp to keep it extra secure from flapping in the wind. Those grommets in the plastic tarps just tear our too easy, so the answer is a weave on top.
The Cornish X chickens in this are very happy. They grow fast, and I leave a lamp on at night as it was cool, and it helps bring in bugs which is additional protein.
The layer chickens are too small for this 2 x 4 wire. They slip out, but slip back in. This will work for the large meat hybrids at about 3 weeks. I think the smaller birds need about 6 weeks at least.
I have seen some people have electric fencing on their machines. That seems appropriate as this thing if you had predators around would be like meals on wheels, as there is not a floor in it. That is the reason for this, is no chicken pen to clean out on these ranch raised birds which pick grass, bugs and their chick grower.
I am impressed enough for this, that when the big donation comes in, we will be energized to build another of these, and I think a half size for turkeys and ducks would be great.
I have had no problem with wind and it has been windy in 30 to 50 mile per hour winds. That is very good, but all the same do not put this where it will get lifted. I know you can stake it down, but it is meant to be less labor than more work. Dog screw in anchor stakes might be the best for that.
This has to be moved about every 3 days. Chickens are messy and they do tramp around and eat things. I am using them as my preliminary lawn mower in the high grass, and then trimming back with a push mower.....if it rains the grass comes back, and everyone is happy with a green floor.
People mention about this working on late garden fertilizing and I can see how this would be a great thing for gardening. My plan is to recycle this in a trial for a cold frame in winter use. That would mean plastic for sun and the removal of the tarp.
This took us about 10 hours to put together, as this is a prototype and when you do that, you have to jig the design to what you have pictured in your mind.......plus had the problem of expanding this to get hardward in the wheels, as I was originally just going to pull this.
So all in all, this is cost 110 dollars for tarp, wheels and metal. The wood was around 100 dollars too, as that green lumbers is not cheap, but it lasts or is supposed to in the elements. The wire was around 80 bucks, and other additions, I suspect in star screws I had, hog clips I did not have......this was a 300 dollar budget blower.
If you make this out of expensive horse panels which I could not get, but have the 2 x 4 inch wire, and are heavy, this would be 150 bucks probably for 3 of them, but you still need the wood to bridge it all together. I thought about scrap angle iron would be nice, but I did not have that, other wise that would be a heavy duty contraption of a Chickwagon.
I hope this helps people who are thinking about something like this. I know this is a shorty in height, but I can bend over to 4 feet as the chickens do not need 6 feet ceilings.
Use your imagination if I do not get pictures up as wifi adapters cost money and voila after Obama sucked 17 trillion out of the world for his Wall Street and European bailouts, only you richtards have all the money now.
Nuff said
agtG
