| Archive for Downsizer For an ethical approach to consumption |
| tahir |
Poultry fencingSo how do I keep em safe? I'm looking at fencing off an area of around 1 acre, this'll be divided over layers and probably 4 batches of meat birds and maybe some quails. Huge population of badger, fox and rabbit, got Munjac too.At the moment I'm thinking 6ft stockproof with rabbit proof at the bottom plus a line of electric at top and bottom. What do we all think? |
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| thos |
It sounds very expensive - are you sure you need to fence the whole acre? | ||||
| Chez |
I think that that sounds
a) very hard core - a much larger scale than us. It should do the job, I should think - but is it overkill? Why can't you just use 6' chicken wire and roof with netting? Are your meat birds going to range around or do you plan to keep them confined to a run to fatten (thinking that I've heard that Sassos really don't move around very much under their own steam, too). In which case, would some kind of large, but moveable pen-and-house set up for each of your batches of meat birds might be more cost (and land) effective. I am thinking of the ones they have at Wernlas ... will go google for a pic in a minute. I also think b) I had no idea that Munjac predated on chickens. That's some scary-ass deer 
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| JB |
"poultry fencing"
"1 acre" "6ft stock proof" "line of electric at top and bottom" 
Are you adding guard towers and spot lights as well 
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| Jonnyboy |
'No chicken has ever escaped from Mrs tahirs chicken farm' | ||||
| Chez |
Not a great website - but pic top right, here. | ||||
| Chez |
"Chickens DON'T plot, Mr Tahir ..."
Now everyone else has mentioned it, I have 'Colonel Bogey' stuck in my head
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| tahir |
In one of me books it recommends 6ft with a return at the top. I'm planting 120 odd hazels in there too, the idea is that the top line of electric might keep squiggles out, it'd mean I wouldn't have to put treeguards on them either | ||||
| tahir |
Essex innit, we're all scary ass, in fact I'm hairy scary ass now you mention it |
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| TAVASCAROW |
Save your money & buy a couple of rolls of electric netting & an energiser & fold them around your 1 acre.
Wont keep the muntjack out but badgers & foxes will only need one tickle & you wont see them again. 
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| tahir |
Really? What about rabbits? They've burrowed under the electric into our veg plot, and once there's a hole.... |
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| Chez |
Thank you for that touching image .
Hmmm. Re covering the run versus electrickery - I see your hazel/squiggle-foilment plant. I was thinking about the nylon two-inch square stuff you can get from Interhatch. But if you want trees larger than six feet tall ... I've seen a fox climb a six foot fence ... |
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| Treacodactyl |
I think you'll need to ensure there's nothing close to the fencing on the outside, so pesky varmints don't climb up and jump over. | ||||
| tahir |
And the foxes round here are very healthy looking |
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| tahir |
The only thing close will be grass, I think we'll have to ensure that this is kept down regardless of the option we take. |
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| Chez |
You could always mine the perimeter with cluster bombs. | ||||
| Chez |
It's just - an acre seems a HUGE amount.
How many birds are we talking about here - run the figures past us? |
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| JB |
I read that as mime the perimeter
I have visions of Tahir trying to persuade to persuade his chooks that there's an impassable boundary by feeling his way around an invisible wall. Well I suppose it's cheaper than stock proof fencing. |
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| tahir |
I'm thinking of 4 lots of meat birds on the go at a time (24 each lot to start with), 16-24ish layers and some quail. The thinking was that there'd be room to expand if we decided to commercialise it (yes I know it's large numbers to be non commercial but I'll be raising eggs and meat birds for the whole family). The breeds I'm looking at are all supposed to be free ranging: Farm Ranger: A yellow skinned and shank bird with brown feathers reaching weights of 3kgs by 82 days and heavier over a longer period. Firm textured and traditionally flavoured. White Farm Ranger: Similar to our 431 but with white feathers not brown. Capable of weights of 3.6kgs* over 91 days and reports of 4.5kgs* by 105 days from some clients. Poulet Goulois: Salmon pink feathers with white flesh an established French Label Rouge style chicken. Smaller than the Farm Rangers reaching 2.2kgs* over 84 days. Naked Necks: In either black feathered and legged or a red feather with either white or yellow legs. This is a specialist gastronomic free-range bird with tender and tasty meat of fine texture. An average weight of 2.3kgs* at 84 days. Guinea Fowl: Tender and tasty with an increasing demand in the British market place. We offer a heavy breed reaching 1.7kgs* at 84 days. An excellent meat bird. |
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| tahir |
It'd never work, I haven't got one of them stripe t shirts |
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| lottie |
My guinea fowl could fly that high ---they were on the shedroof last night---are you going to clip them?
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| tahir |
I'll have to I spose, if they get out we'll never get em back in, it's a 10 acre field |
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| lottie |
I see my neighbours guineas up to half a mile away but they go back every night
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| tahir |
And the foxes don't get em?
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| TAVASCAROW |
Foxes got all my neighbors guineas. They like to roost in trees & a 6ft fence wont stop them. Covered pens a must for them IMO & the quail obviously. |
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| Chez |
That's the trouble with b***dy guinea fowl - you might as well set up a stall saying 'Fox Take Away - Get It Here'. Don't get me wrong, I love them; but they always seem to be at least Kipper on the the fishy scale of madness - and when the wind blows they rapidly escalate to some sort of non-measurable Squid Plus level. I've spent many horrible evenings trying to persuade a dozen down from the top of my Ma's industrial-sized greenhouses in the rain and a gale, with them all perched in a row and yelling blue murder.
I'm now trying to convert acres to square yards in my head. As I understand it, you need space for: 4 x 24 of broilers at a time - and they reach killing weight at roughly ten to twelve weeks? Which is four batches every three months. 24 layers Quail So, that's six batches? Will you be staggering the broilers so that you hatch roughly 24 every three weeks and kill 24 every three weeks? Or will you hatch six dozen together and kill six dozen every twelve weeks ( ), but just have them living in 'pods' of 24?
I'm not sure quite where I'm going with this ... but humour me. |
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| tahir |
So where are we going on this, what will keep me fox secure? And are we saying that I should make a smaller covered enclosure? How would that be subdivided?
I was thinking that the layers would have a house with 2 doors so they could alternate their run. |
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| tahir |
I'm thinking of a 4 weekly kill cycle, 24 every 4 weeks to start with. |
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| tahir |
Depending on strain they're looking at 10-16 weeks, and you never know I may end up keeping pure breeds too/instead. |
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| Chez |
Re fox secure, yes, I think so. Also yes re two alternating pens for the layers. I think, if it was me, I'd have three pens for the meat birds ... or maybe even only two, depending on how quickly they feather up. If you kill at twelve weeks, are they fully feathered earlier than trad breeds? Then assuming you'd hatch every three weeks, you'd have two indoor pens with heat lamps and two houses with large pens - or, maybe, two houses with two doors and pens, as per the layers. And as I killed one lot, I'd move the 6 week olds on. Each pen would be about 6 by 12 yards. And I'd roof it with the interhatch netting stuff, particularly the guinea fowl. For the quail you'd need smaller mesh and you wouldn't need 6 foot high pens. And then, perhaps, I'd get them in to a routine whereby I let each pen of adults out every day in rotation to free-range, so long as there was a person about. And feed them in their pen about 3pm and shut them up. I'd probably not let the guinea fowl out at all; or I would resign myself to losing a few and budget that in. And I'd buy a dog and train it to bark like mad when it heard a fox or a badger - my Ma's two are quite good at that. |
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| tahir |
There definitely won't be a person about all day, no way. And until the new house is built this'll be summat like 50yds away from the house and at least 20 yds away from the veg plot, and now I think of it behind my mulberry trees so not highly visible from where people are likely to be. | ||||
| tahir |
I've thought of that, but it'd be another thing to look after, and there's no way we'd get dogs and not train them properly, takes time... |
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| wellington womble |
Or you could buy a couple of alpaca weathers - sposed to be great at fox-guarding (although I don't know how they'd fare against a muntjac!) and learn to spin. Prolly cheaper than all that electric fencing........ | ||||
| tahir |
Err, young womble, learning to spin is definitely not on my to do list... |
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| Maxwell Smart |
Chicken fencing? First it was geese and now it's chickens. What's with all these posh fowl in the UK taking up gentlemen sports?
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| tahir |
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| lottie |
No they prefer my ducks
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| wellington womble |
so flog it to frewen. Still beats fencing! If you really won't be pursuaded, we have endemic foxes round here - locals go for chicken alcatraz (I'll see if I can get a pic) or electric netting (will definitely get a pic, next time I go to the farm for eggs) Every so often, a fox comes and looks at the dogs. They go nuts, and it doesn't take the blindest bit of notice! The road keeps them down a bit, but they're still thriving. |
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| katie |
My neighbours have fenced about a quarter of an acre for chickens using those 8ft high wire panels workmen put round holes (and the name of which escapes me ) It worked out at about £20 per panel but the advantage is, of course that you can move them round.
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| pookie |
Rheas? | ||||
| Jonnyboy |
Tahir, why don't you start with just a few to get the feel of it, then bring your 5000 birds in? | ||||
| tahir |
We want to rear our own chicken, so if we're doing it then we're doing it, basically. Doing at this scale will enable us to actually pay someone to look after em. The idea is that we'll sell our birds at £15 a go (£1 more than we pay for generic but good free range halal) and eggs at around £3.00 a doz to family.
It'll also mean that when we kill there'll be enough birds to make it worth getting a nephew, brother etc in to help kill, clean and distribute on the day. It'll be our first tentative step to generating income. |