Casa Pollo Continues

Finally, even with the snow, cold winds, chilly days, and John's full-week schedule, we are making some progress. Which is a very good thing, because we had to move the chickens out of the mini-coop in the garage, into an XXL Pet Play Yard, still in the garage, but so much bigger. We are all so eager to see them running and flapping around in their new chicken yard outside and roosting and nesting in their new coop!

Today I got the screen door installed. A few days ago I stapled hardware wire mesh to one side of the the screen door to keep out predators. Next, the chicken wire will go up. We'll be using railroad ties to dissuade any critters from digging into the coop. And we'll be installing bird netting to keep the hawks, and any other climbing, flying pests, out, too.
John got the back wall up and completed the metal roof. And I laid down the vinyl flooring, to make it easier to clean and disinfect inside. We plan on laying wood shavings on top of the vinyl, too.
We got some walls up today, too. And I installed the roosts.Jackson and Jeremiah helped us work into the evening (believe it or not, it was only 6pm in this picture. The sun sinks below the mountains pretty early in our area (the eastside of the Sandia Mountains....so we don't get spectacular sunsets here, but the sun does rise earlier, and it takes longer to creep over the Sandias above Albuquerque.)
Here the boys are stapling hardware mesh wire for the ventilation window on one of the side panels. During the winter, we'll attach plastic windows, to keep out the drafts, but allow sunlight in.