Today's Adventure

We're planning on adopting some chickens in a month or two (hopefully either from Farm Sanctuary or Animal Place), so we've been preparing for our new additions... we have a very old wooden shed on our property that used to serve as a chicken coop years ago, and we decided to try to restore it to its former glory and purpose. First though, we had to move it to the part of the yard where we wanted the chickens to be. That was the task for this morning. Bear in mind two things - (a) this shed is over fifty years old, which means it is pretty sturdy, but also getting fairly rotten, and (b) we moved it once before, about four years ago, without too much trouble.

Here's a picture of what it looked like before we began (not the greatest picture; I took it while it was snowing a few weeks ago) ...


Anyways, we started out today by trying to pull it with Matt's truck - no dice. Then we pulled it with the tractor - no dice. We made a train with the truck and the tractor and were able to budge it a little, but by this point the tow ropes were tearing into the structure and it was becoming clear that we were going to be pulling it to its final resting (i.e. burning) place rather than where we had originally hoped. Even so, we needed to get it away from the surrounding vegetation to make it safe to burn.

Finally, I pulled it with the truck while Matt pushed it with the tractor. Uh oh.

(That's the bottom of the shed you're looking at. And no, Mom, Carlos wasn't anywhere near it when it tipped over.)

Our yard got torn up pretty nicely in the process!

We were disappointed to lose the shed, and our free, existing chicken shelter, but it was also pretty comical. After a bit more time with the tractor, all that remains of this grand old shed is a sad little pile of debris, waiting to be incinerated. Kind of sad.

Bonfire, anyone?

And now we're back to square one with the chicken coop - I've been looking all over online for plans that will work, but we really don't feel like tackling a big or expensive project... ugh. Oh well, we'll figure something out.

If money and time were no object, I'd love something like this -

Source: http://www.middlesexdesign.com/chickens/coop.htm

There's also this cute little pre-built shelter that looks pretty nice, but it would be less flexible as far as housing other kinds of animals in the event that we should also decide we need a few ducks, geese, or (hope of all hopes) turkeys -