Peacocks

[chicks4erin]

I still have a few weeks to go before putting my girls in their cube and WIR, but I was curious does anybody block off the nest section with cardboard until they are about ready to lay? I know seen quite a few posts saying that when they first start sleeping in the Cube, a lot of times they’ll all pile up in the nesting area and get all full of poo. I thought maybe blocking that section off until they were close to lay might solve that issue. Is their any reason not to block it off?

[chick wiggle]

Theres no reason not to block it off, but you'll have to be clever because ive known chickens still get in the on top of footballs, cardboard and flower pots. It may be a battle at first, and one most of us give up on quite soon

And if you do succeed, you may well find they still perch on the divider anyway.

Once they start laying, they tend to stop sleeping in there............but not always!

 

Chickens eh? who'd 'ave 'em!

[Daphne]

And as a note of caution I found my very large cockeral dead in there on top of flower pots on their side - he'd had his time for other reasons but its always slightly niggled at me wondering if somehow he got trapped overnight, so now I just grin and put up with increased poo picking duties

 

I think if I was serious about blocking off the nest box (for winter when PBs don't lay for example) I'd be tempted to put up some sort of physical barrier across the hole.

[Redwing]

Apparently there is a size of tub trug that fits in the hole like a cork - I couldnt tell you which size that is though!

[chicks4erin]

And as a note of caution I found my very large cockeral dead in there on top of flower pots on their side - he'd had his time for other reasons but its always slightly niggled at me wondering if somehow he got trapped overnight, so now I just grin and put up with increased poo picking duties .

 

Oh dear, sorry to hear about your roo. Thanks for the warning. I guess we'll see how this goes.

 

Thanks everyone for your advice.

[chicks4erin]

This is what I came up with as a solution until we get closer to when the girls start laying eggs. My chickens are still only 16 weeks and I know I had read somewhere that the roosting bars weren't good for their feet, so this takes care of the roosting bar issue and sleeping in the nesting box. I put them out in the Cube when they were 9 weeks and so far so good, they all sleep on top of each other in the area where the nesting section would be, hopefully when I put the divider wall in they will stay on the roosting side. I used my daughters cardboard blocks to build up the area of the nesting section to level it with the roosting section.

 

Picture 084 by chicksinthesuburbs, on Flickr

 

Picture 085 by chicksinthesuburbs, on Flickr

 

Picture 087 by chicksinthesuburbs, on Flickr

 

Picture 125 by chicksinthesuburbs, on Flickr

[stu]

I got my batch before they started laying, and to be honest, never even wondered about closing off the nesting area. I just assumed they might go in there and lay because it is a quiet spot. They do now, and it seldom has anything other than eggs to pick out. They sleep mostly on the bars.

 

The nesting box has shredded paper in it (a useful by product of having to get rid of loads of notes and documents) It is very easy to clean out, and also composts quickly.