4m x 3m Omlet pen, cube, new auto door still boxed and coop light

[MadMitch]

Assembled my new cube yesterday. As advised by you wonderful people I have put it just off the ground and built a new plank ladder as the chickens I am getting are only going to be 6 weeks old.

Read the Omlet blurb about number of chickens etc. As I am getting heavy breeds I will be only having 6 in the cube.

When I ordered my chickens I really wanted two Marsh Daisys but due to nearly all the ones that have hatched been cocks I won't be able to get any at this time.

The question is if I wanted 2 at a later date would I be able to get an Eglu for them, I read somewhere that the eglu is not to be used for heavy breeds but I'm sure I have seen some on here that have RIR & sussex in them?

On another note I was in WH Smith yesterday and bought a good book by the practical poultry lot. Apologies if someone has mentioned it before. It has all sorts of information in it £9.99 It was with the magazines if anyone is interested.

 

[Mrs Frugal]

Wow, that looks like an excellent book to have on the bookshelf. Thanks for posting it as I'd not heard about it.

 

The Eglu wouldn't be suitable for really heavy breeds unless you only kept a couple in there and let them free range for the majority of the day. The run is the restricting part as it's only really designed for 2 hybrid sized hens to spend long periods in.

[MadMitch]

Thanks Kate,

Is that the restricting part with the cube as well? Although I bought a run with it I haven't used it as I decided to build one in the end. My run is 17ft by 8ft. Will this be big enough for 6-8 heavy breeds? I would only want to put 2 heavy breeds in the Eglu.

[Mrs Frugal]

I would think the Cube run would also be restricting for really large breeds although I believe it was designed to suit all breeds - I still feel that the run is too small for a lot of large birds. The recommendation is for one square metre of run space per hen - more for heavy breeds but I am so bad at maths that I'll never convert feet to metres .

[chelsea]

I agree with Kate.

 

We have 3 large chickens, 2 huge cochins and a big old hybrid. We had them living happily in an eglu until this February. The were fine roosting in the eglu but the run size is restrictive due to the height. We have our own built run (see pic in signature) so an eglu in a walk in run is fine. The cube is also fine with the big breeds IMO, but again the cube run is restrictive if you have a lot of big breeds. If you dont and allow them to free range a lot you will be ok, otherwise I would again suggest building a walk in run.

[MadMitch]

Here is a picture of my run, waiting my young girls (6 weeks) arriving tomorrow.

 

[Snowy]

I would say that your run and cube are absolutely fine for heavy breeds Mitch. Loads of room there! And I don't think the Marsh Daisy is as big as the others, more hybrid size, so an eglu would be fine for them.

[Christian]

Looks fantastic MadMitch!!

 

Lucky girls.

[Mrs Frugal]

Looks fab! They have plenty of room there .

[Cooks]

that looks really good

[Egluntyne]

It looks great....all that pristine Aubiose!

[ubereglu]

Looks great! I didn't know you could take off the wheels...

[moomin]

Your run is lovely, you have plenty of room there.

 

You will really enjoy having younger chickens, mine were 8 - 10 weeks old when I got them they were so sweet they did not know how to cluck they cheep like little chicks. And the Barnevelder thought the Cochin was her mum she kept trying to snuggle under her feathers!

 

Now, a month on, one of them, the Barnevelder, is just starting to cluck and they have tripled in size.

 

They are both big breeds I love the big girls