needed for the spores, and add them to tonight’s dinner. She was looking forward to a real meal for tonight, though the omelet was holding her for now.
The plastic cargo bin that took up a portion of the truck bed was filled to capacity now. There was nothing more they could get for human supplies without it potentially blowing out of the back, and they needed the rest of the space for the chickens and their feed.
The goats would have to wait for another day, as much as she hated putting it off. She’d need to build something like stalls in the back of the truck, or maybe in the trailer, to keep them from getting hurt during the drive home.
They went to the feed store and filled up the trailer with different types of hay and chicken feed, and drove straight to Bala from there.
Thankfully the chicken rancher had cardboard transport boxes similar to what pet stores used for puppies and kittens, so they managed to fit two roosters and ten hens into the truck box, with enough room around them for air to get into the boxes. The entire time they traveled through the area near Bala, she was on the lookout for Gerry’s green Civic, but there were no sightings, so they got home without incident.
They’d only been gone about three hours, but somehow Leigh and Cameron had really gotten on top of things, and from inside the truck it looked like they were both in one piece still. She was pretty sure all the posts had been put in already, so she got out to take a look at everything they had accomplished.
“Wow. You guys do good work! Come here for a second. I want to show you something,” she called. When they came over she pointed at the flat cement around the post and showed them how to round the cement so water wouldn’t pool and rot the wood.
While Cam and Leigh repeated the process with the other posts, Mac and Kirk laid out hardware cloth for the base of the chicken pen and covered it with dirt. They surrounded the enclosure with hardware cloth and then poured cement to join the bottom edges to the base.
To avoid waste, Mac made a shallow mould with a few slats of wood. Grabbing a trowel she scooped the hardening cement out of the mixer and pressed it into the mould. She’d judged the amount almost perfectly. When it dried they would have a stepping stone. Then she rinsed the mixer out and dumped the dirty water where they would eventually start the path from the animal pens. No point killing the grass anywhere else.
She got started on the gate for the chickens while Kirk helped Cameron and Leigh, putting together a corrugated plastic roof that would cover most of the enclosure, with hardware cloth covering the rest. They added more plastic to the back wall and half of two sides, while Mac installed the gate.
She had to keep the roosters separate, which meant dividing the enclosure into three sections before she’d be able to let them out of their boxes. Mac pounded some long stakes into the ground, and attached a section of hardware cloth. She divided the back area in two for the roosters.
When everything was built she put in the water troughs. She hated doing everything backwards, but at least they could release the chickens now.
Leigh took one look at a suddenly-freed chicken, and her opinion was made abundantly clear.
“Ewww! They’re disgusting. Is that shit all over it?”
“Yup. They’re not normally that bad, but it’s not exactly her fault. Where else was she going to shit? We should wipe them all down as we go, before we stick them in the pens. I don’t think they’ll take too kindly to a hosing, and that just seems mean to me after they’ve been in a box for so long.
“I know none of us really wants to touch them, but we can clean off our hands and use the hand sanitizer before we go in and shower. We’ll take turns there. You don’t have to worry about running out of hot water or anything, either. We’ve got a tankless water heater which heats on-demand, instantly.
“Make sure you do
The plastic cargo bin that took up a portion of the truck bed was filled to capacity now. There was nothing more they could get for human supplies without it potentially blowing out of the back, and they needed the rest of the space for the chickens and their feed.
The goats would have to wait for another day, as much as she hated putting it off. She’d need to build something like stalls in the back of the truck, or maybe in the trailer, to keep them from getting hurt during the drive home.
They went to the feed store and filled up the trailer with different types of hay and chicken feed, and drove straight to Bala from there.
Thankfully the chicken rancher had cardboard transport boxes similar to what pet stores used for puppies and kittens, so they managed to fit two roosters and ten hens into the truck box, with enough room around them for air to get into the boxes. The entire time they traveled through the area near Bala, she was on the lookout for Gerry’s green Civic, but there were no sightings, so they got home without incident.
They’d only been gone about three hours, but somehow Leigh and Cameron had really gotten on top of things, and from inside the truck it looked like they were both in one piece still. She was pretty sure all the posts had been put in already, so she got out to take a look at everything they had accomplished.
“Wow. You guys do good work! Come here for a second. I want to show you something,” she called. When they came over she pointed at the flat cement around the post and showed them how to round the cement so water wouldn’t pool and rot the wood.
While Cam and Leigh repeated the process with the other posts, Mac and Kirk laid out hardware cloth for the base of the chicken pen and covered it with dirt. They surrounded the enclosure with hardware cloth and then poured cement to join the bottom edges to the base.
To avoid waste, Mac made a shallow mould with a few slats of wood. Grabbing a trowel she scooped the hardening cement out of the mixer and pressed it into the mould. She’d judged the amount almost perfectly. When it dried they would have a stepping stone. Then she rinsed the mixer out and dumped the dirty water where they would eventually start the path from the animal pens. No point killing the grass anywhere else.
She got started on the gate for the chickens while Kirk helped Cameron and Leigh, putting together a corrugated plastic roof that would cover most of the enclosure, with hardware cloth covering the rest. They added more plastic to the back wall and half of two sides, while Mac installed the gate.
She had to keep the roosters separate, which meant dividing the enclosure into three sections before she’d be able to let them out of their boxes. Mac pounded some long stakes into the ground, and attached a section of hardware cloth. She divided the back area in two for the roosters.
When everything was built she put in the water troughs. She hated doing everything backwards, but at least they could release the chickens now.
Leigh took one look at a suddenly-freed chicken, and her opinion was made abundantly clear.
“Ewww! They’re disgusting. Is that shit all over it?”
“Yup. They’re not normally that bad, but it’s not exactly her fault. Where else was she going to shit? We should wipe them all down as we go, before we stick them in the pens. I don’t think they’ll take too kindly to a hosing, and that just seems mean to me after they’ve been in a box for so long.
“I know none of us really wants to touch them, but we can clean off our hands and use the hand sanitizer before we go in and shower. We’ll take turns there. You don’t have to worry about running out of hot water or anything, either. We’ve got a tankless water heater which heats on-demand, instantly.
“Make sure you do
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