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Chicken Tractors
To us, automatic chicken waterers and chicken tractors are a
package deal. Together, they keep our chickens healthy and happy,
and prevent the filth and smell that turns so many people off of
chicken-keeping. Below are our blog posts about chicken tractors
--- how to make them, how to use them, and why we love them.
 2010 is currently on track to be the hottest
summer on record, with July already beating out the scorching Dust Bowl
summer of 1936. We've felt the heat on our farm, and are keeping
a careful eye on our flock. Heat exhaustion is nothing to mess
with, as we discovered during our first year of chicken-keeping when
two of our birds succumbed to the heat.
How do you know if your
birds are too hot? In an effort to cool down, they will pull in
their feathers, stick out their "elbows", and start to pant.
That's your cue to make sure your flock has access to shade and water
at all times. If you're worried, throw some ice cubes in your
homemade chicken waterer --- your chickens will adore
the cool treat, and the ice water will help lower their body
temperatures.
Chicken
tractors can be
dangerous at this time of year since chickens are confined in a small
space. Turn the tractor the wrong way, and your hens will have no
shade to retreat to during the blazing afternoons. We are careful
to situate our chicken tractors so that the protected side is aimed
toward the sun on summer days, and when temperatures soar into the mid
90s, we add a tarp to provide extra shade.
I have to admit that
this year I counted the days until the dog days officially ended on August
11. It's all cooler from here!
Even though we keep all
of our chickens on range, there's a limit to how much greenery they can
find in late winter and early spring. Before grocery stores
entered our hollers, Appalachian folks lived the same way, eating
primarily canned vegetables through the winter. By this time of
year, they were dying for the first fresh produce --- a spring tonic
that boosted their immune system and drove away the winter blues.
I think our chickens
deserve the same kind of treatment, so I take care to hunt out greenery
for them as early in the year as possible. As I've posted in the
past, chickweed starts growing very early
and is a chicken favorite. A bit later, creasies turn into the
new succulent leaf of choice. If you don't have either of these
available, why not sprout a few extra seeds  while
planting the peas in your garden? As long as you don't buy
treated seeds (covered with a pink powder), your sprouted peas are a
tasty and nutritious treat for your feathered friends.
Of course, greenery is
nice, but any chicken will tell you that bugs are best. If you
stumble across any grubs while digging in the soil
this spring, put them in a cup and toss them to your hens --- the
chickens will go crazy over the nutritious treat.
Looking for other ways to
keep your chickens healthy? Check out our homemade chicken
waterer that
provides copious clean water and keeps your birds in top shape.
 I'm
the official chicken
tractor mover.
Every morning, I tug the
tractors to a new patch of ground, often just a few feet over. In
the spring, though, I'm using
the chickens to work up new ground, so
sometimes I move a tractor all the way across the garden. One
day, I moved the Barred Rocks from the front garden down past the
trailer and fruit trees, then over the hill at the end of the mule
garden.
A few hours later, Mark
came to me with a puzzled look on his face. "Anna, where is the
Barred Rock tractor?" he asked.
"Oh, I decided we should
celebrate Easter a little differently this
year," I replied. "Rather than hiding eggs, I'm hiding chickens!"
 Chicken
tractors
are perfect for use in a confined space like a lawn or garden.
But as we considered branching out into raising our own birds for meat,
the idea of multiplying our chicken tractors by three began to seem
unfeasible.
Over the last three
years, we'd given several hens away and then added some new chicks to
bring us back up to nine hens in three tractors. The nine hens
laid enough eggs to keep us eating farm fresh all through the winter (a
tribute to our tractors since our neighbors' chickens all stopped
laying for a while.) During the summer, I wished we had twice as
many chickens to keep the yard mowed and fertilized, but during the
coldest week of winter I wished we had half as many since the grassy
areas began to give out and churn into masses of mud. Overall,
nine hens in three small tractors seemed to be our two acre cultivated
area's carrying capacity, and I couldn't conceive of adding several
more tractors to house broilers.
We'd also discovered the
chicken tractor's weakest link --- roosters. Chicken tractors
have been used on a large scale to raise male chickens for meat, but
the cockerels are slaughtered before they fully mature and begin to
fight. As we'd discovered, chicken tractors are also great for
hens as long as you get the nest box right so that they don't lay on
the ground. But a mixture of hens and a rooster in a tractor is a
nightmare. We couldn't fit the recommended 10 to 12 hens and a
rooster in a tractor, so the rooster overmated his harem of five.
When
our hens' backs became featherless and bloody, the rooster went into
our bellies.
Without a rooster,
though, we're stuck always ordering chicks, which is not so
appealing. Clearly there had to be a solution to our meat bird
dilemma. (While you're waiting for the answer, check out our homemade chicken
waterer, great in
tractors.)
This post is part of our Chicken Pasturing Systems series.
Read all of the entries:
|
 My third foray into chickens came almost by
accident. Mark and I had moved onto our farm and were chatting
with a neighbor about our wish to become more self-sufficient. At
the time, we barely had two pennies to rub together, so when he
suggested buying us twenty chickens, letting us take care of them, and
sharing the eggs, we lept at the idea.
I'd done some reading
since my coop days, though, so Mark built three chicken tractors to
house our new hens. The hens were Golden Comets who had just
started laying, and they loved the grass and bugs they found in each
day's fresh section of grass. I've already posted at great length
about why
we love chicken tractors and how
to build a cheap chicken tractor, so I won't go into that
here. Suffice it to say that once Mark invented the Avian Aqua Miser, we thought we'd completely
solved the chicken housing problem.
This post is part of our Chicken Pasturing Systems series.
Read all of the entries:
|
 Although
we considered trying to domesticate the hen and rooster we saved during
that snowy winter, my first foray into chicken keeping came almost a
decade later. I was living on the farm owned by Mark's aunt and
uncle. The old log barn halfway down the driveway had a chicken
coop attached, and when I showed an interest in livestock, I was
quickly given a dozen or so hens and a rooster to put in the coop --- a
mixture of Buff Orpingtons and Australorps.
The coop was large and
airy, and had a large run attached, but before we knew it the ground
was scratched down to bare earth. This is the way the majority of
Americans raise their chickens, and at the time I didn't know any
better. The eggs were still better than storebought, but the hens
didn't lay much in the winter and the yolks were nowhere near as yellow
as those we get from our hens today.
 Here
I am emptying out their poopy chicken waterer. Mark hadn't
arrived on the scene yet, so I spent a lot of time pounding frozen
waterers against the ground to knock the ice out and lugging buckets of
water down the hill. Now, of course, we'd install one of our automatic chicken waterers and at least clean up that
portion of the coop.
Mark's aunt grew up with
chickens, raised in the traditional farm style. She told me that
her family always cut a fresh red cedar to put in the coop each
year. They believed that the cedar kept lice and other bugs away.
This post is part of our Chicken Pasturing Systems series.
Read all of the entries:
|
 In
my last post, I showed how Mark
used green plastic netting to cover the chicken tractor.
Another innovation in this
chicken tractor is the addition of a day time roost out in the open in
addition
to the night time area under the roof. I don't have any proof,
but I think it's good
for the morale of the flock to have multiple areas where a hen can be
to
herself and get some personal space.
This is the end of
this construction series, but we plan to build a new chicken tractor
sometime soon with even more innovations, so stay tuned!
Meanwhile, check out our homemade chicken
waterer, perfect for
tractors.
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
 In
my last post, I showed how Mark added
a large access door to the chicken tractor. Next step is to cover
the rest of the tractor.
Green plastic netting
is Mark's new favorite material for covering
chicken tractors. It's easier to cut and manage than traditional
poultry wire and we think it looks better. Small dry wall screws seem
to be the perfect
choice for attaching the larger corner sections of the netting to a
wooden surface.
The green plastic
material we used for this chicken tractor has an added advantage of
being a nice comfortable size for
each hen to poke her head through to access some goodies outside the
tractor. Combine bugs with fresh water from an automatic chicken waterer and you have happy hens!
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
 In
my last post, I showed how Mark made the
roof of the chicken tractor. Next step is a door.
We've
learned the hard way that it's very handy to have a door in the chicken
tractor big enough to get a whole person inside. Mark framed up
the door out of red cedar branches and covered it with green plastic
netting. He added a board to the side of the tractor so that the
chickens would have room to stand up under even the shallowest part of
the door, then framed around the door and hinged it in place.
While
he was at it, Mark cut a circle in a sheet of cardboard to make a handy
mount for our automatic chicken waterer. Stay tuned
for the next installment of our construction series.
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
In my last post, I
showed how Mark added
a perch to the chicken tractor. Next, he made a roof out of
aluminum
flashing to cover half of the perch and the whole nest box. This
layer will make it waterproof and will also reflect some of the hens'
heat back on them during cold nights. Flashing is cheap and a joy
to work with. It can be cut with a pair of scissors.
The outer layer is some
scrap carpet that worked out really well on the
other two tractors. It seems to provide a nice layer of
insulation. If you don't have any scrap carpet handy and you're not the
type to scrounge for some at the dump then I recommend a section of
that astro turf carpet they use on miniature golf courses. The
combination of flashing and carpet allows us to leave
our chickens in the tractor all winter.
Stay tuned for the next
installment. Until then, check out our automatic chicken waterers
that never spill or fill with poop.
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
 In
my last post, I showed how Mark
build the frame and nest box of his chicken tractor.
This photo shows the nest box from the outside. Notice how Mark
has
put a door there so that I can easily reach my hand in and take out the
eggs without disturbing our girls.
As you can see, he also
added in a long perch and some more wooden
support pieces. Stay tuned for part three of the chicken tractor
construction. Meanwhile, check out our automatic chicken waterers.
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
Mark's most recent
chicken tractor is his best one yet, and he also
obsessively documented the construction process to make it easy for you
to repeat it. This is the
chicken tractor that cost $20 to build.
 This
animation shows day 1 of the construction process. Notice that he
starts by making a rectangle out of logs (red cedar this time) just
like he did with his first
chicken tractor.
This time, he added an additional support beam within the rectangle to
give the tractor more stability. He notched the logs with the
chainsaw
and also used brackets for attachment.
He wrote:
I feel it's important to build the nest
box first once you have the
frame together. Place it at least a foot above the ground with a big
enough hatch for easy egg access.
I've found that the more comfortable and closed in your nest box is,
the
less your hens are likely to lay an egg on the ground.
Stay tuned for the next
installment of the construction process. Meanwhile, check out our
homemade chicken
waterer.
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
 Our
fourth tractor was based on the simple remesh
and log design of
the first three chicken tractors, but added some new
features. Most notable were
two additional access doors.
We like to give our
chickens kitchen scraps to supplement the storebought feed and the
plants and insects they get from the ground. Our girls love the
scraps a bit too much --- when I go to dump a bucket of scraps through
our first chicken tractor's door, the hens mob me and I have a hard
time emptying the bucket. The new tractor includes a small access
hatch on the top (which you can see on the top right of the
photo). Now I can dump a bucket of scraps into the tractor
without getting mobbed.
Another problem with the
old tractor was the eggs. Since the tractor only had one access
door, I had to open it and reach my hand around the corner to get the
eggs. Our hens often thought I was bringing them more food, which
made it difficult to get to the nest box.
 For
our fourth tractor, Mark created the nest box out of part of a
dryer. He cut a hole in the back of the dryer to give the hens
access, and left the door against the outside wall so that we can
easily reach in and get the eggs without going through the main part of
the coop. As an added incentive for laying, Mark cut a picture of
Colonel Sanders off of a take-out bag and glued it to the inside wall
of the nest box. Just a little reminder to our girls that they
need to lay, or else!
Stay tuned for a
description of our fifth and best chicken tractor. Meanwhile,
check out our automatic chicken waterer, perfect for use in tractors.
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
 We
stumbled into chickens, so Mark made our first three chicken tractors
very quickly to give them a home. This photo shows his earliest
design which was very cheap and relatively easy to build.
First, Mark cut down
some trees that were encroaching on the garden and used them to make a
rectangular frame for the bottom of the tractor. He cut a length
of concrete-reinforcing mesh (remesh) to form a hoop, drilling holes in
the base logs to run the ends of the remesh through and attach it into
place. He framed up a door with smaller branches and covered the
whole thing (except the bottom) with chicken wire. Inside, he
made a nest box out of an old milk crate and a perch out of another
branch. Then he covered the back quarter of the tractor with an
old tarp to keep the chickens snug.
Although it is
functional, this tractor had to be slightly rebuilt three years later
because the logs on the ground started to rot out. We used
walnut, and in retrospect wish we'd used red
cedar, which is naturally rot-resistant. Treated lumber or
PVC pipes are another good option if you want to spend a bit more money.
Mark also went in and
added a cover to the nest box. There's nothing worse than nice,
fresh eggs getting soaked and muddy, and our hens didn't much like
laying in the rain either. As you'll see, Mark made the nest
boxes in his later tractors even fancier.
While you're planning
your chicken tractor, don't forget to add in an automatic chicken waterer --- essential to protect
your hens from dehydration which happens when conventional waterers
spill on uneven ground.
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
You can shell
out hundreds of dollars and get a ready-made
tractor, but Mark has had great luck with making our own for under $20
apiece. This post is the first in a series about how to make a cheap, serviceable chicken tractor. During the planning stages, you should keep these top tips in mind:
- Ignore people who say you should
add wheels to your tractor. Wheels make the tractor hard
to maneuver around your garden and are a general pain.
- Make multiple
doors on your tractor.
Our best tractor currently has two, but I'd like it to have three --- a
door in the back of the nest box for easy egg-stealing, a door on the
top of the tractor so that the hens don't mob you when you drop in
scraps, and a big door which allows a whole human to get in for tractor
repair and lets the hens get out easily if you want them to free range.
- Make your tractor as light as
possible.
As the chief tractor-dragger, I have to say that pulling even our
lightest tractor uphill on wet grass often ends up with me on my
butt. Lighter next time, please, Mark!
Of course, you need to
add in all of the usual components --- a
perch as well as a spot for chickens to get out of the sun and
rain. Otherwise, it's pretty hard to go wrong with tractor
construction. Give it a shot --- surely you can build something
serviceable for less than a few hundred bucks!
We invented our homemade chicken
waterer specifically for tractors. Check it out to prevent
spilling of water on uneven terrain.
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
We have three chicken tractors, and I wouldn't be surprised if we have twice that many in a few
years. For the uninitiated, a chicken tractor is a moveable
chicken coop/run with everything your chickens need in a small
space. Each morning, I move the tractors to a new patch of lawn,
where they scratch for bugs, engulf greenery, and fertilize the
ground. We get free lawnmowing and fertilizing along with better
eggs
while the chickens get healthy additions to their diet --- it's a
win-win.
Animals are an important part of any natural
ecosystem, but most modern
farming tries to cut them out of the picture.
Chicken tractors
put animals back in, but in a controlled manner. Left to their
own devices, free range chickens would make short work of a vegetable
garden, eating up your tomatoes and strawberries, scratching your mulch
aside, and generally making a nuisance of themselves. (Yes, I
speak from personal experience.) On the other hand, pen chickens
up in a permanent coop/run and they will eat all of the greenery in a
matter of days, leaving bare earth which doesn't provide any of their
food.
Some folks drag
the tractors directly over their garden to fertilize, but I've found
this is difficult with raised beds, and also gives the chickens less
food. So we added the mulching lawnmower to our chicken tractor
system, allowing us to cut grass fertilized by our chickens, then use
the greenery as mulch or compost in the garden. Thanks, hens!
We invented our homemade chicken
waterer specifically for tractors. Check it out to prevent
spilling of water on uneven terrain.
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
We firmly believe that automatic chicken waterers
and chicken tractors go hand in hand since they both keep your chickens
happy and healthy. Every time we see chickens in a conventional
coop setting, we cringe, but we realize that it can be a bit daunting
for first-timers to build a chicken tractor from scratch. It's
really not so hard, though, and can be surprisingly cheap --- Mark
built our most recent chicken tractor for under $20.
During the three years
that we've lived on the farm, Mark has built
five chicken tractors. In the process, he's learned a lot,
documenting most of that information on our homesteading blog.
I'm going to be summarizing the most relevant bits of information from
that blog on
this blog over the next month or so. Now is the perfect time to
start thinking about next year's chickens. Why not curl up with a
hot cup of cocoa and plan a chicken tractor while you're at it?
This post is part of our Introduction to Chicken Tractors series.
Read all of the entries:
|
 Here in zone 6, we're able to
leave our chickens out in their tractors all year. We have a
water- and wind-proof section where they can roost at night (or during
drippy days), and we never see any sign of our chickens being too
cold. In fact, tractor life seems to suit them --- their yolks
are still as orange as summer eggs even though it's the middle of
December.
We do make a couple of
changes to prepare our chickens for winter, though. As the days
get chilly, we flip our tractors 180 degrees around so that the sun can
shine directly in. (During the summer, we put the solid side to
the sun so that our birds have some shade.) We are also more
careful to move the tractors every day, since cold, wet soil can
quickly be churned into a morass of mud.
And, of course, we have
to be a bit more vigilant to
prevent our chickens' waterers from freezing. Still, care of our
nine hens probably takes no more than ten minutes a day, thanks to our automatic chicken waterers and Mark's handy
tractor-building skills. I always recommend that folks make the
switch from coop to tractor as soon as possible!
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