Cécile Stelzer Johnson

Linda Johansson wrote:Cecile—I have kept them locked in until later so that I can move the set up while they’re still inside. I don’t care to do that because I keep it basically as full of chickens as I realistically can, so they really need as much outside time as possible so they don’t get crabby and stop laying. Also historically the water has been located outside because the waterer I had, they would roost on top of it and poop in the water. I now have a different water system where that won’t be an issue.
Even in the deep cold of winter (-40 F at times), my first winter my chickens continued to lay nearly an egg a day. This winter there was slightly less but again, I was getting by for the winter with a coop that was a bit small, so when it got super cold and they wouldn’t go outside they felt a bit crowded. Next winter I will have a much more spacious coop which should help with that issue. Interestingly, I find that my chickens are consistently done laying by 2 pm every day, as during those extreme cold snaps I have to collect twice daily to keep eggs from freezing. If I collect at about 8 am and 2 pm, I get all the eggs without the first ones freezing before I can get to them.

Yep: I pick eggs twice too. We don't always get -40F, and with a well insulated coop, frozen eggs are not too much of a problem.
You seem to have figured out that perhaps they are a bit cramped? You said: "I keep it basically as full of chickens as I realistically can,". The "more specious coop" you are planning will take care of any problem, I think.
My 40 birds drink industrial quantities of water, even in the winter. (I had another breed, that would actually eat snow. Not that I'd encourage that ). It's a bit more messy to have a bowl, yes, so I have 2 rubber bowls and I let one go down then change the water, then the other one, inside the coop.
I have noticed that they do not poop in the water that is outside, in shallow metal or plastic pans and get filled once in a while with rain. I have a theory that chickens will perch on the edge of their water bowl if it is too high for them to reach the water from the ground. Mine are indeed too tall, so you gave me a great idea: (Thank you) I'll make a bench, or perhaps sink them into a piece of furniture, a bench or something. so their feet are already close to the level of the water. That should cut down on poop in water...

Linda Johansson wrote:I have honestly not had any issues with hawks or owls, just the occasional raccoon, but I find that if I let them free range completely in the summer I lose too many eggs to the tree rows or haystacks. This is, after all, a business..

Have you tried releasing them a little later in the day? I let them out around 10:00am. That gives me enough time to prepare their troughs and see if there's another chore I'll have to attend to that day, like cleaning the poop boards.
I got this great information from Chicken Guard:
" Although they will lay less often in the winter, when there is not enough light to trigger egg production, when there is enough light to trigger the process, the time to make the egg will be the same length it is in summer, about 26 hours.

If they are very cold in the winter, they will also stop laying in order to conserve energy. Laying an egg takes a lot of energy and nutrients. A poor diet is another reason that hens sometimes stop laying or lay less frequently.

Will hens lay eggs during the night? (mine do sometime!)
If the egg is completed during the night, the hen will not lay until morning. Chickens are busy sleeping at night, and they will not wake up to lay an egg, but gather the strength and energy they need to lay the egg first thing in the morning.

With an average production cycle of 26 hours, you can see that your hen will not lay at the exact same time from one day to the next. In fact, they will lay a few hours later each day. Since their reproductive cycle is triggered by light, they will eventually lay late enough in the day that it will not be light enough to trigger a new cycle to start. In this case, the next egg will not start to form until the following morning. Which means there will be no egg laid until the following day.

I'll second Dennis B. on that one: "Build big.  You can always block off part if it is too much, but the chicken math does come into play at some point."

Yep: when you have only 10 birds or so, you may question the wisdom (and expense) of building for 50 birds, but then you realize that it would be nice to store all the feed, hay, straw, charcoal, grit, calcium, extra feeders/ waterers, buckets, hoses, incubators and sled (to travel the water to the coop if it's too far) and you will think:  
"Why did I build so small? Now, I will need to build another coop", so the savings just evaporated... It is usually  more expensive to build 2 structures than one larger one.

In a larger building, you may eventually choose to raise other critters too: In the overhang that I used for honey bees (that keep dying with the neighbors spraying) I can now store other stuff... Repurpose...

Well, Rowan, first, welcome to Permies. Yep, it's smart to ask others ahead of you on that path what they would have done different.
Not knowing exactly what your goals are or how cold your winters get, I can only give generalities:
1- don't put your coop too far away from the garden or from the house: I have an extension cord so I can put a ceramic heater on the wall. If it was much further, the extension cord would be a real problem to keep them warm or prevent their water from freezing.
2- close to the garden, so it's not too much of a chore to bring them grass, crops grubs, whatever.
3- make it as tight as you can against rodents: technically, rodents could still walk in through the trap door, but once  they are in there, there is no clutter, nowhere  to hide so roosters and hens can kill them.
4- If it gets quite cold where you live, insulate the building: Insulation is cheap. Cold chickens (or hot chickens as they are even more sensitive to the heat) eat more.
5- I used to have my perches lean against the wall. No more: You always have some chickens that get pooped on. I built a set of 3 big wide shelves in the center  of the room, covered with an easy cleaning PVC sheet (Like the make shower walls with) about 6" above those, is where I have my perches. They are 2X4 and slanted so they can grip them better. By making 3 shelves in the middle of the coop, I can walk all around for the cleanup, have more perches and  I have seriously multiplied their roosting space. I clean the 3 shelves scrupulously once a week and the pure manure can be placed anywhere I want for aging, laying on mulch etc.
5- I have a "winter run". It's a hoop house attached to the main building with just a trap door allowing them to come and go. They are warm and comfy at night, but during rainy/ snowy days, it's handy to have an area just a bit bigger than the coop, with no floor (It's very sandy here) where they can stretch, dustbathe while I can change their litter. I offer some food in there too as well as grit and oyster shells. Gutters work well so they can all eat at the same time: I had round feeders and once I increased the number of birds, it just wasn't adequate. The winter run is opened every morning and closed every night so they can forage outside, weather permitting, under all the fruit trees. I recover the water from the roof and have a number of bowls that fill up in the rain or that I fill up from a barrel attached to the coop.
I have 40 birds in there, and I wish I had a larger coop yet so I could place their feed inside. There is an attic, but it's dusty and I don't care to crawl up there: It's more of a crawl space. (at 77, I'm not going up there!) I only put my 2 incubators there and some transport cages and extra stuff that I use very rarely.
I had built a shelter  for my bees about 20 ft away, and now, that's where I put my chicken stuff, but it would have been better inside.
Do you plan on egg layers or meat chickens?
If you choose Cornish cross, which grow very fast, they should be butchered around 8 weeks, so they will not need laying boxes.  If you keep other chickens long enough that they will lay, you may want to choose your warmest wall to hang the laying boxes, with a narrow (PVC) perch in front: They can jump up to see if the nest is occupied rather than land on the edge of the box and scare a laying hen, but I don't want it to be too comfortable that they might sleep there and poop. There's about 3 ft between the shelves/perches and the laying boxes, so they often get up on the shelves and from there, get in the laying boxes. (serendipity: I had not planned it but it works slick this way.)
I hope this will get you to think a little deeper on specific details of your operation. Keep asking: that's the only way you will know before you make a costly mistake. Let us know how you are coming along with that project. This is just to get you thinking. You will get other ideas as you start.
Oh, When I purchase some chicks, I usually wait until late in the season: Tractor supply will have a sale and let them go after keeping them  (and feeding them) for almost a month. I prefer having those young ones in the coop for the winter: I can keep them warm and toasty and away from any predator in stead of getting them at the same time as everyone and taking them outside when they are still tiny.
Good luck, Rowan...

Christopher Weeks wrote:How often does this happen? I think this is my first time seeing this.

It's a first for me too, although sweet peppers often have another little sweet pepper growing inside the other one. Navel oranges have something similar going on at the blossom end. Strawberries can have convoluted fruit, although not quite like what you have pictured here. Interesting....
Of course, we know that some unfortunate baby twins are born conjoined sometimes, and need a complicated operation to separate them. I have quite a few apple trees and have never seen anything like this. Thanks for the pic!

Mike Barkley wrote:

That looks incredible, Mike. It's really impressive. the contraption looks great! I don't know anything about wind turbines, but getting that kind of speed at 20-22 MPH should generate a lot of electricity. Later in the video, these are decoupled and they do not go as fast. Would it be possible to add the power of all of them?

Abe Connally wrote:cheap beehive: http://www.velacreations.com/bees.html

I was interested in that one but they must have removed it.
I would think that the shape of the barrel and the lack of ventilation might be a problem as condensation could be deadly for bees.
How would you clean it?

Casey Halone wrote:I have thought of a few but would love to hear more.
cutting the top and bottom off and one cut down the side, using as roofing for a green house, as it would allow a good deal of light but still provide shade. at least the white ones seem to.
a playslide for the kiddos.

Hmm roofing. I had not thought of that one, but I looked at the typical circumference of those big plastic 55 gallon barrel, and it's just over 6ft. (72.25 to 73.8 inches ( 183.5 to 187.5 cm). Assuming you could warm them and lay them flat, you could create a roof for a pretty big kennel. (It's almost impossible to lay them completely flat because they get a bit smaller and constricted at the top and the bottom, but  removing the top an the bottom would still leave you with a nice flat surface to work with.
If you cut the top and the bottom generously, you would have 2 very sturdy drinking pools for ducks, or if covered, nice dust baths for your chickens (add sand, ashes, DE and you ae good to go!)
2 years ago, I found 2 bright yellow ones that I cut lengthwise to make 4 shallow planters for herbs on my dark red deck. It looks pretty, besides being cool and not costing me anything (Try to find a planter that big that won't cost an arm and a leg!)

Neither: I make a paste of dishwashing liquid and baking soda: It works well for all baked on stuff or cooked/burnt on stuff.  Stainless steel kettle in which something was burned respond to this treatment too.
The stove top comes clean as new, too: I start by removing the loose stuff. If syrupy stuff got spilled, that's the worst: I have to drown it in water first, wait and scrape.
after that, a thick paste of Dawn and baking soda works really slick: I apply, wait a few minutes then come back with a blue towel or sometimes a soft scrubbing pad. Repeat if you find a stubborn spot.

Angelika Maier wrote:We have this terrible drought right now and sheep are dying of starvation. I think they are so desperate that they damage the paddock beyond repair, digging out the roots. Farms are pretty big here but there is only sheep paddock and very little vegetation. Farmers don't even have gardens or some chooks or an orchard. I wonder apart from the better holding of water on properties could you actually make rain by planting more trees? Farmers complain a lot and it is probably very hard for them, but they do not change the practices.

Planting trees in quantities large enough to make a difference will require willpower at the scale of the nation. You do not indicate how much yearly precipitation you get, just that you are in Australia zone 10, which is pretty darn tropical. (I'm in zone 4b, Central WI.)
So armed with that, I looked it up. There are regional differences, of course "Coastal areas of Queensland, Northern Territory, and Western Australia often experience upwards of 1,500–2,000 mm, with some areas exceeding 3,000 mm (120 inches)."
By comparison, I get and average of 31-32" per year.
So it appears to me that you are not so much low on annual precipitation, but you appear to have a very wet and a very dry season.
Your solution might reside in holding on to the water that you do get. Building underground cisterns like my great grandma had under her house might be your salvation. It would at least allow you to have ample water for you and your animals, maybe even a nice garden?
In the south of France, a whole village would build a cistern for the town and carefully meter that out.
It is not perfect but it's better than having starving sheep
I remember looking up the number of gallons of water you can collect from a regular sized roof. I almost fell off my chair!
"One inch of rain on a 1,000-square-foot roof produces approximately 600 to 623 gallons of water.
and that's just one inch of rain! A cistern can be made of a septic tank or several that are joined. A normal septic tank is about 1,000 to 1,500 gallons so with barely one inch of rain collected from a roof, you are already more than half way up a septic tank full.
The Romans would build their house with a central patio and instead of having the rooves shedding water away, they would have it collected in the middle and down to a large cistern that was mostly covered to prevent bugs and other critters. But, you know, the Romans were really pretty good with that kind of construction!
You did not indicate what sort of soil you have and if it would pay to excavate swells and berms, but if you have more clay, that might help too.