Cluck, Cluck Chicken Truck

The town I live in is debating the pros and cons of back yard chicken farming.  If you've been following my blog then you know that we have chickens.  I was against getting these feathery friends from the start but really they are not all that much trouble and the kids love searching for eggs. And boy, after having your own chicken eggs, you just can't go back to store bought.

At first my husband was moving the chicken tractor all over the yard so we could get nice fertilized grass on our front lawn.  But on nice days he'd let the chickens out of the coop and then I'd have a fertilized front door mat and fertilized deck which I inevitably stepped in and I didn't appreciate it.  I came up with a brilliant (if I do say so myself) solution and we fenced off a wild portion of our property at the back of the house and now the chickens can run about wherever they choose in their nicely contained chicken yard.

Original Cluck Cluck Chicken Truck

The only problem is that they are more susceptible to predators now that they are out of the coop more often.  An eagle paid us a visit and we lost my son's beloved 'Lady Skidoo' - yes, that was her name.  A weasel got 'Ginger Snap' and then we were left with 'Liquorice'.  Well, we have finally replenished our stock. One chicken was just not enough....not enough eggs that is.  So we went to our chicken lady, Ev and bought 3 more chickens.  They are a Barred Rock breed and the one we had left was a Nera.

I posted about our fabulous chicken truck that my talented hubby made.  Well that chicken truck is now too small for 4 chickens.  It was made for 2 and ended up housing 3 and could probably do 4 ok but we like to give our chickens lots of space.  So we, or rather my husband designed a new chicken truck.

Having learnt a few things from the first time around, these were our prerequisites:

1.  4sq ft. of space per chicken in the coop and 10 sq ft. for a run
2.  It must be on wheels
3.  It must have shelter over the food area. Chickens don't like their food soggy!
4.  Eggs must be easy to retrieve.

It took me four hours to nail the chicken wire around the new chicken truck and a tutorial on the jig saw had me cutting out the cute little windows you see.  Just another two handy skills I've picked up while living here that will look great on the resume!

The beautiful new Cluck, Cluck Chicken Truck

One of the many gorgeous eggs we get daily.

The girls' laying quarters

The girls' back yard