Solitary chicken - need advice

[miffy]

Hi there, we have been lucky to have Daisy, Primrose & Violent....oh I meant Violet , for 4 days they have already laid 7 eggs ....clever girls!!

Tonight we have tried to move the eglu with extra run and discovered that not only is our garden on rather a slope but it is very uneven. We cannot get the skirt of the run flat...its got no flexibility at all. Other than digging out and making a permanent base does anyone have other solutions or suggestions

[Egluntyne]

Hello and welcome to the forum.

 

You could try weighing the run down with heavy rocks.

[miffy]

Thanks for that thought, will give it a try this morrning. The Eglu is my mother in laws and she insists they need to be on the grass so chippings is not an option as yet. We were worried we may damage the run if we put rocks or stones on the skirt but I guess we will just have to give it a go.

We are all getting a lot of pleasure from the girls, especially Millie our English Springer...she loves her new toys even if they do keep pecking her nose

I will show mother in law the gallery some of the runs there look amazing on chippings

[miffy]

3 strategically placed bricks and all is well

 

Dont know why we didnt think of that last night

[Gallina]

Bricks will help, but they won't be heavy enough for permanent use, I am afraid: a fox will soon learn to kick those aside easily. You need paving slabs or heavy rocks.

 

You would be better putting the run on a permanent site, flat and properly weighed down.

[Lapinou]

Have you tried run pegs? or tent pegs I understand are just as good? I guess it depends on quite how bumpy your ground is, but we find that the run pegs work well on the areas that spring up because of bumpy ground. I'd also suggest finding somewhere permanent that's either level already, or can be levelled. Why does your MIL insist it's kept on grass?

 

And lucky you, getting eggs so soon! We're still waiting FOUR weeks on!

[Ain't Nobody Here]

I find coping stones - long, flat & heavy - are ideal (if you happen to have any lying about ).

[quickcluck]

are they to stay with you on a perminant basis or are they holidaying with you????

 

If they're to stay make it more perminant as keeping the foxes away has to be more important than grass.....

 

If they are holidaying with you, as you are enjoying them so much will you get some of your own???

 

Any excuse really........ now you know how great they are...

[TAJ]

Rocks used here when they are on certain parts of the garden.

 

Tracy

[miffy]

Mum in law and girls all live with us, so perhaps I need to persuade her that a permanent base would be best. Mind you The girls were extatic when I let them out this morning and they had fresh grass to eat. The first one out stopped dead to eat the grass and the others couldnt get out

[Gallina]

I suspect your Eglu is new, so this doesn't apply to you: but anyone getting a secondhand Eglu must make sure that it has the two extra square pieces of run that were issued a year or two ago to rectify a weak point where foxes were getting in: see for example this thread:

http://club.omlet.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=652&highlight=level+fox

 

Unfortunately these squares are no longer available in the shop, so anyone with an old Eglu that doesn't have them would be advised to put the whole Eglu on slabs.

 

Sorry, that wasn't hugely relevant, but it struck me that a lot of people are buying secondhand Eglus at the moment and may not realize that they are missing an important bit of kit.