Coon Attack

Dang Coons! We lost one chicken (one of our new young soon-to-be layers) last night to a pair of Raccoons who staged a night time assault on my makeshift chicken coup that was serving as a temporary housing spot while I finished the straw bale coup.

I was working about 10pm in my office when Jenn yelled frantically down the stairwell..."Something's getting the chickens!" I ran upstairs, grabbed my headlamp and ran outside to ALL hell breaking loose!

A Raccoon had scaled the mesh fencing and got hold of one of my chickens through a 3"x6" gap in the roof eave of the temporary chicken run and was trying to eat and pull it through the hole. It bolted as soon as I came up running and I chased it down the fence—it climbed a tree and jumped over the fence.

I turned my attention to the 2nd one. The sucker was just standing there watching me...waiting to see what my move was. I'm sure he wanted to stay around and get a chicken dinner and was NOT leaving unless he had to. I grabbed a 2 foot piece of fire wood and chased his striped-tailed ass up the fence the other way and into the night.

Let me say, these had to be two males...they were freakin' huge! Probably at least 25 pounds and at least 2 1/2 to 3 feet long. I was pretty darn close and got real good looks at them. I was within 6 or 7 feet of the first one before he scaled the tree and fence.

My poor young chicken was really messed up, she was hanging out of the gap, upside down, blood dripping, squawking a horrible squawk. I pushed her back in and she jumped down and was obviously messed up. We decided, even though the new coup wasn't plastered, we had to move them in the new coup right away.

So, Jenn stood guard over the chickens while I rushed around with a headlamp and finished putting latches on the doors and getting the roosting bars installed inside the new coup. Luckily, the coup is all done except for the plastering and it's totally predator proof...after loosing 14 chicks in Terrebonne, I wasn't taking any chances with the coup I was building.

After the chickens calmed down and went back to roosting, we went in, put them in portable dog kennels and transported them to the new coup. Sadly, I had to put the one who got attacked out of her misery, she was pretty mangled with deep wounds on her spine and neck and was in shock.

I put out a live trap last night, but they didn't come back. I'll keep trying.

Strawbale Chicken Coup Project

The kids during the window box construction, testing the "load bearing" capabilities, as bales will be stacked on top. They really enjoyed the whole bale building process with all the fun bales to climb and play on. We built hay forts and houses and tunnels. I ended up with some leftover bales and they still have a hay playhouse next to the coup under a tarp.

This is why I'm not running very hard right now...trying to beat winter. I'm almost ready to earthen plaster the bales. I've had clay and sand delivered from the quarry and have done some test balls to see what ratio of clay to plaster is looking good. I chose bentonite clay, as it was available at my local quarry and has a better water proof property. Sand is a rough sand that is the grade commonly used in concrete mixes.

There are definitely some things I'd do differently with regards to the bale construction process and the framing if I did it again. I found a great online resource and would follow a lot of his philosophies if I do it again. (See http://www.strawbale.com) I'm thinking a straw bale workshop/studio at some point.

Most importantly, DON'T use 2x4 stud frame. Invest in 4x4s and design as a minimalist timber frame structure...less trimming bales, as working around the studs was time-consuming and a pain in the neck. Also, the chicken wire was a pain. I'd use some kind of poly mesh next time. My forearms look like I got in a cat fight.

Another boneheaded thing I did was install the chicken wire on the oustide BEFORE bale infill. Stupid move. It was a pain to go back and infill shallow spots that the bales didn't quite fill against the mesh by cutting and stuffing, then re-stapling the cut holes. Royal pain.

Bales are filled all the way to the ceiling. The side upper plywood will have metal tin panels over them for a "mod-Dwell-magazine" style look. Lower 4 feet where you see bales will be earthen plastered. I'm not going to get the plaster's finish coat done before winter. I'm shooting for one rough scratch coat on inside and outside in the next week (very similar to a cob type mix).

Here are some picks of the process...

Side view during construction of the roof, rectangle area will be a window.

Window box completed during bale infill. Note the chicken door on the right. It's a narrow used cabinet installed into the bale wall. That will be the official chicken entrance into their run.

Coup during bale infill. The cabinet on the left turned on it's side...used cabinet from a local used place called Pack It. I made it into 3 laying boxes on the inside and was the width of my bales (see photo below for the inside shot and more info). The other thing I did was frame the main door to a standard door size (38" x 7'4"), went to the local used place and picked up an insulated exterior door with glass and frame for $30...tacked in a top 2x4 to the exact height of the door I found, added one more vertical 2x4 to the exact width of the door, screwed it in and...BAM! nice door for cheap. No door construction needed. It was about a 20 minute install.

The layer boxes (old cabinet on it's side with some plywood customization). The laying box floor on the inside is slightly slanted toward the back and I will glue outdoor carpet on the floor of each laying compartment. When you open the cabinet door (on the outside...see image above this one), there is a trough that eggs, after being laid will roll to the catch trough for collection by the kids from the outside door. Idea is they can't smash the eggs AND we can leave them for almost a week with food and water and they can lay all they want and we come back and collect out of the trough.

Movin' to "The Woods"

The house from the upper half of the property.

The 1/4 acre crater complete with picnic table, 2 firepits and cliffs to climb on. This shot is taken from the North Rim of the crater (the tallest cliff, at 15 feet)

Well, sorry for the lack of posts the past 2 months. Busy as can be with the new house move. We just bought a house on an acre in an area south of Bend's city limits. And as an added cool bonus, the acre has a 1/4 acre, 15 foot deep crater (photo above).

I have to say, after a few weeks in the new place, it's nice to be back in Bend. Terrebonne was just a little too far out. I'll miss the everyday training runs at Smith Rock, but the new locale is just close enough for me to commute to town on my bike, but have nice privacy and room for the kiddos to run.

An added bonus is my home office has it's own entrance and it's own bathroom. It's really quite perfect for our family. We're feeling mighty blessed in the current "economic crisis." Plus, being above town 500 feet (we're at about 4000 feet)...we'll get some good snow on the property. Sledding, snowboard and ski jumps right in the yard! Sweet.

After we closed on the house in mid-Sept, I left 7 days to work on the house before we moved in. I pulled over 100 hours labor on the house! It was an epic ultra-labor week. I put in cork floors in 4 rooms and painted 3 rooms and worked on the chicken coup.

Also, my good buddies Josh and David designed and installed built-in shelves and a "hobbit" size walk-in closet in the loft to convert into an official kids bedroom. On one of his days off from work, my friend Tyson helped get up the skeleton frame for the chicken coup (which I'm still working on). Strawbale chicken coup post coming...giddyup!