May 19, 2012 - First Hens Moving Day

We have our hens in a portable hen house but it also has a portable electric fence around it so that the hens can move around freely and pick up all kinds of tasty treats from their yard. It's also supposed to deter any predator or curious passerby. But we hadn't tried moving until today...

Saturday was super windy (that would be a strike against us). Multiply that with frantic hens, a curious dog and people who have no idea what their doing and we're in for a crazy mix. :) Of course, we did have a fearless leader so what more could we need.

We finally got all the chickens rounded up and safe inside the hen house. Then we moved the fence around by everybody grabbing a couple posts and moving simultaneously. (Think uncoordinated synchronized swimming.) We got all the posts pushed back into the ground and then we staked the lose ends. After that we tied a couple of spots to tree branched so the wouldn't fall over in the wind.  

See the fencing in the picture above? You can see how much the wind blowing by looking a Bo's hair and how much the fence is curving in between posts. 

We managed to get it up without too many harsh words. The hens seem to enjoy their new space especially around the trees. We learned taht we're not going to do it the same way next time. We're going to follow the recommendations from the fence company (imagine that) and gather up each post while not crossing the mesh fencing and then we'll lay the fence flat in the new spot by laying down each post and then standing then upright when we get it all arranged correctly. (Reading directions is a marvelous thing.)

Happy Boundaries!

ALLISON