As the weather warms up, our coop can start to smell, shall I say, less than appealing.  While this homemade coop refresh spray should NEVER be used as an alternative to keeping a clean coop, after removing all the soiled bedding and replacing it with new bedding, scraping down the roosts and refreshing the nesting boxes, this all natural scented spray will leave your coop smelling wonderful.

I created my own recipe for a pleasant smelling spray that could be used in between and after cleanings to keep our coop not only smelling nice but also help repel rodents, insects and calm our laying hens naturally.  I love that I am not using anything that could harm our chickens and also provide aromatherapeutic benefits to them.

 
 

 
 

 
 

When the vinegar smell has mostly dissipated, the spray is ready to use. Strain the contents and then pour into a spray bottle to use full strength - or slightly dilute with a bit of water if desired.  Spray in your coop as needed.

 

~About the ingredients~ 

 

White vinegar is a natural disinfectant. It has antibacterial properties, kills mold and is also an ant repellent.  (Apple cider vinegar, while great for adding to your chickens water and drinking yourself for all its health benefits, shouldn't be used here - only white vinegar. Apple cider vinegar will attract fruit flies.)

 

Note: You can substitute vodka for the white vinegar. Vodka is an all natural cleaning agent that kills insects instead of merely repelling them. It is also antibacterial and kills mold and mildew, and is odorless.

 

Lavender is a naturally calming stress reliever, increases blood circulation, is highly aromatic, and also an insecticide.  The aroma is highly beneficial to settle laying or sitting hens.

 

Mint is a natural rodent repellent.

Vanilla is a natural fly and mosquito repellent.

I started using vodka (buying the largest, cheapest bottle I could find at the liquor store) and much prefer it to the vinegar because the vodka is odorless. In fact, the spray smells so nice that I use it in our home as well as the coop. 
 

 
 

Note: As mentioned at the beginning of this article, this spray is NOT a substitute for regular cleaning of your coop and at the slightest whiff of ammonia, all soiled coop bedding should be removed and replaced with fresh bedding. 

 

 
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Light filters through a bush that attracts hummingbird-sized bumblebees outside my bedroom window. I ask myself a question, "What does a farmer's wife do today?" My husband asks a similar one--namely, "What does a farmer do today?"

Coffee is a given. Lots of it. Worship and prayer happens after the second cup.

Then what?

I'll tell you about today, even though it's not quite 11AM.

Tom and I discussed our schedules. The conversation went something like this:

"What are you going to do today?"

"I don't know, what are you going to do today?"

"Not sure." Tom paused. "I could plow all the fields, build a storage shed, plant vegetables, install an irrigation system for four acres, order more seeds, join the Chamber of Commerce, or attend the tractor event. Heck, I could even try to grow something!"

These statements increased my anxiety. "I should can vegetables, mow the lawn, machete a path through the woods, order chickens, build a coop, hire another caregiver for Mom, check Sam for tics, pay the bills, cancel our Florida bank accounts, and set up an accurate accounting system." My voice volume increased as I recited my list.

Instead, we began with prayer.

Then we ate warmed-up oatmeal at the white farm table. We figured out how much seed we'd need for cover crops. Tom exited with Sam to plow the field in front of the farmhouse. I called the local seed company and chatted with an expert.

"You can try to go organic, but it's pretty much impossible," he offered. 

I pushed on.

"Do you carry hairy vetch--it's not pornographic, it's a seed."

"Sure, I can get you that."

I gave him the list for cover crops. He mentioned that oats would be a problem. 

Who knew? They were plentiful in the cereal aisle of the local grocery store.

He went on, "How much lime do you want on your field? One or two tons." 

"One ton of lime should do it." (Words I never dreamt  I'd say.) "Oh yeah, I need soil for blocks. We're going to use a mold and put seeds in it to transplant into our field." (I tried to convince him I knew what I was talking about.) "Here's the recipe from the organic seed company."

I gave him the list.

There was a long pause.

"I've never heard of that before."

We came to a compromise. A nine-bag combination: 3 bags potting soil, 3 bags black cow, 3 bags tobacco mix.

Still in my jammies, robe and slippers, I walked out to the field.

"We might have a problem getting oats. I guess it was a bad crop." Pictures of the local cereal aisle danced in my head.

Tom seemed unperturbed. "We can order something else."

I know farmer's wives aren't supposed to be in their jammies at 11 AM, But I'm new to this.

Time for more coffee.

Maybe I'll tackle the chicken coop tomorrow.

I have 30 chicks coming by mail in one week and I figured I would just find a livestock water tank or maybe a large cardboard box to house them in while little. The problem was the livestock tanks used (and very used) were still quite expensive and the cardboard box was pretty flimsy and not re-usable. So, my lovely husband offered up the idea to use some of the free pallets that we have been getting for the past two weekends and make our own re-usable baby chick (poultry) pen. Yea! Great idea. Fortunately for me, he loves to build stuff! Yes, Kristopher, you love to build stuff...all summer long :) The size is 2'8" X 4'4" X 2'8". It is pretty light as well so I can move it around easily. I will put a strip of cardboard in the middle while my 30 chicks need the extra warmth and after a week or two will open it all up to them. The cost of my pallet pen was $20 for screws (which I now have tons of screws let for more projects). Check out the pics below to see the process!

*Note- I can re-use this as a large planter or compost bin.

Head on over to modernroots.org for more projects as I build up our homestead! 'Like' on facebook at https://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/ModernRoots.org 

Recently, we were finally able to finish up the temporary chicken coop/future brooder.  Bess was getting very anxious to get our of her (huge) plastic tote in the extra bedroom, with no regard for how nicely the daybed was decorated.  Go figure.  And by the way, Gracie the cat is SO glad to have "her" room and bed back - she actually didn't hiss at the puppy for once after sleeping in there again for a couple of hours.

Anyway, I digress.  I loaded Bess up in the pet carrier to move her out to the coop. Once I set the carrier inside the coop yard and opened the gate, she wouldn't come out.  I tried to tip it a little and she wasn't having any part of it.  Dried meal worms wouldn't even entice her out.  (Should have tried oatmeal - that girl will do ANYTHING for oatmeal.) Funny girl, thought you wanted out of the tote...  So here's where we discovered that I can crawl right through the coop yard gate and sit down inside quite comfortably.  HA!  I had to take her out of the carrier and she immediately perched on my arm for a good 15 minutes before finally deciding that the grass wasn't going to eat her.  Poor chick. Then she promptly crawled up into my lap to sit for a spell.  Despite all my attempts to get her used to being held when we first got her, Miss Independence did not like being held at all.  And yet now she curled up in my lap.  Eventually, she started checking the place out and nabbed those meal worms.  I had a string of Christmas lights on for her the first night because it was so incredibly dark (she had nightlights in the house) and all new.  At some point, she finally went inside her house and settled down.

Last night, way after dark, she was still milling around the yard.  I was stressing because it was dark, and she was supposed to be in bed by now.  Doesn't she know that's what chickens are supposed to do?  Observing her for a little while, I noticed her trying to jump up at the lights.  So I went and turned them off.  Guess what?  She went right to bed.  Okay... Bess 1, Chicken Mom - 0.  Guess she knows more about being a chicken than I gave her credit for and certainly more than I do.  She definitely needs some friends. Down the road, with a radiant heater, I think our little coop is going to make a fabulous brooder.  Now to get that chicken/duck yard fencing finished so we can build a full sized coop...Bess needs lots of friends!

 
 Putting on the finishing touches.                           Bess checking out her new digs.

The lap chicken! 

Just a little postscript...Bess is trying to crow!  Of course, I think she sounded a lot like a turkey gobbling before too.  Maybe she's multilingual.  In the meantime, hubby has started call her "Bob".  Time will tell I guess.  All the rest of our animals are nuts...why not the chicken?! ;D

Post script to the post script…Bess is most definitely Bob!  He is getting a stronger voice every day and has the telltale long fountain feathers at the top of his tail…oh boy!

~ Like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/KCFarms or our brand new website:  www.pasturedeficitdisorder.com 

There is an advertisement for Horizon Structures on the Community Chickens website that says, “Before the chicken OR the egg ... You need a coop.” Acknowledging that the famous “which came first” puzzle may never be solved, I can assure you that Horizon Structures is on to something here. The coop properly DOES come first, else you may find yourself thinking unkind things while scraping the remains of the day from your bathtub.

The coop in Phil’s backyard did not get built over the Memorial Day weekend. Family outings and other projects took precedence for us both. The chicks remained in my bathroom for another week, after which time I retrieved a decommissioned puppy kennel from the attic and installed it in the living room. The birds moved to the front of the house. It was not really an imposition because they were still very small and relatively tidy creatures, and while I have relaxed attitudes towards housekeeping (yes, this is a euphemism), I am not good at sharing bathrooms. I made a cozy home of the kennel by layering generous amounts of straw over newspaper and adding a thick dowel across the cage for a roost. As long as it was cleaned every day, there was no problem with odor. The cats and the dog were overjoyed at the spectacle. It was during the chicks’ first two weeks of residence in the living room that we really got to know each other.

 I saw their first clumsy attempts at roosting, we watched television together (they fell asleep during The English Patient, but were delighted by a documentary on Calatrava’s Lyon-Satolas TGV station), they ate their first slugs and berries from my garden, they took tiny dust baths in my hands. I fell in love with our little chickens.

Meanwhile, Phil and I continued to dabble with the construction of their permanent home. The self-cleaning, clerestoried dream version of the coop had been simplified to a basic lean-to structure. On a sunny afternoon early in June, we headed out to gather building materials that he had scavenged and stored in a complex of abandoned manufacturing buildings. As we pulled in to the industrial area, he pointed out that the first factory building had recently been set on fire so that scavengers could extract the metal beams from the ceiling. The building was reduced to remnants of brick walls and blistered charcoal surfaces. Curls of corrugated metal siding peeled from the remains: potential roofing material for our project, he noted. In another building, he pointed out where he had created a shallow pool by dumping a load of stones around a water leak. Grasses were growing around piles of old tires and other debris, and he found that birds frequent the area. We continued to the back of the property to an open shed. Stacked here and there were an array of objects collected over the years: heaps of reclaimed lumber, discarded old-style street lamp posts, a speed boat covered in peeling paint, stacks of large picture frames, a vivid red sink. He tossed me a pair of gloves, and we filled the back of the truck with 2-by-6 boards.

Upon returning home, we constructed a 6-foot-by-10-foot platform from the 2-by-6s and surfaced them with additional 2-by-6 boards.

Over the course of the next week, Phil framed the walls and sheathed them in reclaimed privacy fencing.

More 2-by-6s were cut for ceiling beams, decked with plywood, and shingled. Polycarbonate sheeting and heavy wire mesh was added over openings to form windows and allow for ventilation. Old soda crates were added as nesting boxes.

And doweling was attached to the wall framing for roosting. A small door (that doubled as a ramp) was cut into the paneling, leading to an outdoor pen constructed of reclaimed construction fencing.

These panels were attached to the low wall of the lean-to, then topped with one panel of aluminum fencing and some shade cloth for protection from aerial predators and sun. It turned out to be an adorable little cabin, and much too large for four chickens. I found myself making jokes about moving myself in and leaving the girls in my house, but my imaginings did not get very far. Just as the construction was wrapping up, I received a cheery email from our chicken keeping friend: “Phil picked up some of my new batch of blue and brown egg layer chicks today ...”

We now had a total of ten chickens.

So, at last, the original chicks (who had grown to a dramatic size by this time) and the new chicks were moved into their own home.

I was out a getaway cabin, but gained a living room.