Kitchen Garden Forum

I keep meaning to venture out to our local Wyevale.

Appreciate this being brought to my attention, thanks OH

My recent purchases have been in one tonne bags but there will come a time when 60 >70 litre top up bags will be required so daughter and I will be checking out the quality and cost. See if it is value for money

Nice bright day today, not chilly but only 7 > 8 degrees.
Surprised no one was up the allotment this afternoon when I popped up.

Yesterday I finally started putting together the Christmas present I got Mrs Snip, the Eglu for her chickens. Had to stop once it started raining but managed to finish assembling it today. Despite the garden resembling a quagmire bog

The 6 cardboard boxes it came in have now found a second use as ground cover on raised beds up the plot, hence my visit there today Boxes are currently folded, over next few days at some point I hope to be able to slice the folds and cover more ground..

How many chickens do they recommend for that eglu Pa? It looks quite big - what's the actual size?

Eventually I will have chickens on the plot but thought I might try some at home first (Critters have murdered the lawn anyway)!

Westi

Evening Pa Snip, i have to say, you never cease to amaze me how much you get done in a day.....maybe i should get up in the mornings, to try and keep up.....

Are you in good books, with Ma Snip....

Hope they appreciate the HDTV!

Glad to see the detached luxury chicken house has finally become a reality. I hope the chickens ,...... And equally Mrs Snip approved. We'll look forward to seeing them inspecting their new accommodation. . And all that cardboard has come in useful too. Sounds like you have had a productive day.

Just as a matter of interest, how long did it take to assemble the eglu, and was it easier to do than one of the renowned old MFI flat packs??? (And were any naughty words used i its production? )

Westi wrote:How many chickens do they recommend for that eglu Pa? It looks quite big - what's the actual size?

Eventually I will have chickens on the plot but thought I might try some at home first (Critters have murdered the lawn anyway)!

Westi

Hi Westi

The Eglu cube you see in the picture is approx. 1.6mt wide by 3 metre in length including the wire run.

I purchased a 2mt set up plus a One metre extension.

In the 2mt Eglu cube set up they reckon 6 x medium or 4 x large hens
If you add on a 1mt extension, making overall length 3mt run no more than 6 heavy breed or 10 medium

I love the pictures you see of hens on perfect grass, fat chance the way they scratch around.

oldherbaceous wrote:Evening Pa Snip, i have to say, you never cease to amaze me how much you get done in a day.....maybe i should get up in the mornings, to try and keep up.....

Are you in good books, with Ma Snip....

OH


Its not like that every day, I only wish it were. Sheer bloody mindedness and determination sees me through. Many an afternoon ends up with me fast asleep on the settee, fatal to sit down.
Keep going and I'm ok.

Geoff wrote:Hope they appreciate the HDTV!

Hello Geoff Very observant

I only let them listen to the radio since they refused to up egg production to cover their contribution to the Tele licence.
They are very much into listening to bantam weight boxing broadcasts

Primrose wrote:Glad to see the detached luxury chicken house has finally become a reality. I hope the chickens ,...... And equally Mrs Snip approved. We'll look forward to seeing them inspecting their new accommodation. . And all that cardboard has come in useful too. Sounds like you have had a productive day.

Just as a matter of interest, how long did it take to assemble the eglu, and was it easier to do than one of the renowned old MFI flat packs??? (And were any naughty words used i its production? )

Evening Primrose (old joke but couldn't resist it again.)

It was quite funny this morning as the chickens watched me assemble the last part of their new home. They really are inquisitive birds.

They reckon ( the manufacturers, not the birds) about 5 hours to put it together, I would say it was roughly 5.5 to 6 man hours in total putting this together.
Instructions were easy to follow, with understandable diagrams with the text
The Eglu cube itself is very well made of heavy duty moulding.
Definitely no comparison with a MFI flat pack, either in quality or cost.
The wirework panels for the extension did disappoint me a bit considering the cost, but they will certainly do the job

The cube is quality, and the price reflects it. Having said that decent chicken coops are expensive in our view. Cheap ones are just that and don't last.
Having once experienced a dreaded red mite infestation we wanted to avoid coops made of wood.

This one really is easy to access for cleaning out.

No expletives (very unusually) were used during the assembly

Want want want!!!! Can someone let Mr Awty know please??

It would appear there isn't much happening in the world of KG forum members.
Hardly surprising given how much moisture the ground is holding still.

I did manage to get up the plot yesterday morning to find two other plot holders trying to tidy up. All I did was prune back the 'Polka' raspberry canes then called it a day.

Most people on the allotment site seemed to have prepared well for winter winds this year. Just one casualty of winter so far, one plot holder had a aluminium framed greenhouse with plastic glazing. I say 'had' because it currently looks like something that played a bit part in the storm in Wizard of Oz. Its on the same plot still, just, all twisted and mangled up. Beyond repair. His shed also had the one pane of glass in it broken out completely. His luck was well and truly out as no one else has suffered damage so far.

LOSING THE PLOT

Woke up completely convinced today was Monday, even thought site had gone wrong when I looked at time and date of my post above.

In my confusion I even unintentionally deleted my own post that I had made at 9am on Friday morning.

Opps !!

I am going to keep a lookout for the men in white coats, in the meantime I must tidy my appearance up and get this jacket straight

Your new hen hut looks very well designed. It should be nice and easy to keep clean. My hens have the orchard to play in which is about 30 ft square and even though there are only ten of them they've killed all the grass. I put some left over lawn turf in it a couple of years ago in a fenced off section so I could just let them in for a treat but they flew over one day and finished that off too. I give them a helping of brassica leaves every day for their teatime treat so they've still got enough greens to keep the yolks nice and golden.

I'm still trying to tidy the garden but my bonfire is too wet to burn so after three attempts I think I'll have to take it to the dump site. It's all bug stuff that won't compost but is no use for the wood burner and too twiggy for the shredder.

I'm enjoying watching the birds on the feeders at the moment. There's a flock of about 23 Siskin with a few Red poll among them and they're all twittering in the pear tree.

Don't worry PaSnip we all have "what day is it, where am I going, what was I doing" moments

PLUMPUDDING wrote:Don't worry PaSnip we all have "what day is it, where am I going, what was I doing" moments

errm, who are you, where am I.

Rare sight of late on our feeders, pair of greenfinches. Used to get a few each winter, hardly seen any this season.

Had a solitary parakeet on our feeder recently. One to be discouraged for sure. thousands of the damn things in surrounding area's. Noisy, aggressive to indigenous species.

Friday evening I was listening to a song thrush singing it's head off the first I've heard in a few years, this morning the heron has been in my pond it flew off when my wife opened the curtains but has left it's muck all over the surface

Nice day down at lottie today even if I had the dog in tow!

Finally finished Lottie 1 ready for spring, with just the hedgerow behind the shed to sort. Lottie 2 is 3/4 finished with just the soft fruit area to sort, but it took me a couple of hours to weed the raspberry bed on Lottie 1 side so actually quite a bit time to be invested still. I was very fortunate as well that the farmer came with his mega tractor & flipped all the manure heaps, so got some nicely rotted muck to mulch around the Raspberries. Tractor must have been 12 foot high & stupid mutt walked right into it - very amusing for the farmer & his wife who didn't quite believe what they saw I think.

Ran around Plum Beauty with my paintbrush to the amusement of the neighbours, who also thought my sawing technique on the die back on the other Plum was impressive - well actually my language attracted their attention as I managed to get trapped by cut off branch as if fell behind me! Managed to get my beanie back so all OK! And about 1/3rd of the wood trimmings burnt in the incinerator as well! Productive Day all in all! Will pay for that tomorrow no doubt!

Westi