a bennett

1" chicken wire or harware cloth would still allow weasels to get in and they will wipe out a flock in  anight. I had one get in my duck pen and killed three of my big beautiful ducks and it was chicken wire. I am installing 1/4 inch hardware cloth and put a door on their hut for nightime so they are protected from the weasels and I had rats that also killed my chickens at one point killed over 200 of them with traps. Never had a rat in my life and before I realized what was happening was overrun with them and called exterminator and he said they would only deal with poioning them which I would not allow, because the dead rats would poison the wildlife and my other birds if they ate them. So where they are at night is solid cement floor and they are safe when they sleep. the ducks have a dirt floor and chicken wire walls  and a box they go into at night with a 1.4 inch hardware framed door locked at night. Hope this helps dont want you to lose what you worked so hard for.

your some kind of genius to figure this all out. great job,  thanks for posting

love this you have a lot of know how on plants, loved the variety  thanks for sharing

I have had goats for years,  4 nigerians and two jacob sheep. I had a bear two years in a row kill two of my goats. devastating because they are my pets and part of the family. The game warden came and suggested electric which I had had, but it kept blowing out  even with grounding rods so I didn't replace it after the third time. My stupidity thinking a bear wouldn't come after years of no problems. But I was wrong one lean winter and he found my goats.
I had a four foot fence and put wire around the top and the bear came and got the second goat.  we changed the fencing to six foot horse fencing with four arms sticking out holding electric wire. with 4 x 4 pressure treated posts with an electric line around the top also. I don't milk mine, but they have around  a 100 ft oval sort of pen. A thing to know is they waste a ton of hay. I think over half of my supply goes on the ground. And they wont eat any that hits the ground. I dont know if this is true with all goats or just mine might be fussy. I did have a nubian, such a sweet goat, but like I said the males are always wethers. Good luck with your project even two goats are good for companionship it doesn't matter the size of the herd as long as they aren't alone, when I got my first goat he was young and lonely and before I could get another someone gave me two jacob sheep and he was perfectly content sleeping on one of them like a bed and made a close bond with them. Hope this helps.

Ducks are quite messy, I put paver blocks down under and around kiddie pools, I have two set ups one for my old pair of ducks and one for three other ducks. You can use a bucket or a flat shovel to scoop water out, If its too heavy for you, but I just dump mine, the patio blocks keep them from picking up so much mud and poop into the water., In the summer I use the ponds in the winter heated water buckets. I change them daily and keep a brush handy to keep the yuck that sticks to the sides clean. I have to keep my birds confined so they have a big cage with a roof, I have a brook on my property but cant allow them to go to it or I wouldn't have any ducks do to predators. They dont have to dive deep to enjoy themselves the view of them bathing and splashing and having fun is worth the effort, sure on some days I have to refill the ponds, they splash it all out. But I have a water line to each animals coop in the summer, so its not hard to do. Hope this helps, Ducks rock love to watch them, One of mine is 14 years old already, might be her last summer coming. But she still enjoys life. So far so good. I also have a floor squeegie to push all the mud and poop that they do get on the pavers into a pile to pick up and put in compost.

I'm new here and learning a lot, But doesn't enclosing the stove make the metal too hot and might crack it? Even cast iron can only take so much heat right?  Just wondering. thanks

If your looking for quiet chickens, you probably shouldn't have any,  I love the sounds my chickens make, mostly when they roost, but they are loud when they lay eggs, just the way it is.  So if you want eggs, its just something you get along with the territory.  Just think of breakfast while they cluck. Good luck