In a flurry of hammering, tying wire together, and finishing all the final preparations, the family has completed construction of the chicken coop. Cool!

It was a joint effort, a family production, as everyone pitched in to help see the project through to the end.

The chickens spent their first night in their new palace, and they seemed delighted overall. Of course, they generally always seem delighted. I mean, you can't really tell when a chicken is having a bad day (unless of course it ends up on the dining room table, crispy brown and with both legs sticking up in the air).

I should point out, though, that these are egg laying hens and we have no intention of eating these birds.

This coop was designed so that when we're done with chickens (someday) we can use the structure as a lawn and garden shed. The door is large enough that we can roll a riding lawn mower into the shed.

The shed's dimension are 8 feet by 8 feet on the floor, so there's a lot of room for the hens to run around. We have six older chickens in our other coop and eleven new chicks in this new coop. Eventually, when the youngsters grow up into big fat hens, we'll combine the two groups. There's enough room in the new coop for all of them.

We're looking forward to the eggs! They'll start laying in a couple more months.

When building a chicken coop, the obvious part that needs to be done is, of course, to construct the physical building. But there are other things that need to be done.

"Such as?" you ask.

I'm glad you asked.

This past weekend, we dug a trench and lined it with chicken wire. The purpose, of course, is to prevent predators from being able to dig their way in to the coop. With foxes, raccoons, possums, and dogs around (oh, a coyote was spotted last week, too), we need to make sure nothing can get in there.

We spent quite a bit of time draping chicken wire over the top of the pen area; the covering is needed to protect the hens against (of course) animals that want to climb over the fence, but also to protect against hawks. Yes, hawks will attack chickens. In fact, last week a red tailed hawk that lives nearby swooped down and tried to pick up one of our three year old hens. The hawk only got a fist full of feathers, but he got a taste of blood too and I suspect he will try to come back.

I'm not aware of any great way to discourage snakes from getting in; black rat snakes love chicken eggs (and they'll strangle and kill a chicken even if they can't eat it).

These chickens are a lot of fun, and both the Ameraucanas and the ISA Browns are gentle hens.

We do not have any roosters (we don't want roosters, nor do our town ordinances allow it).

Several people have asked me this question: Don't you need roosters in order to get eggs?

Think about it. You only need roosters if you want fertilized eggs.

Anyway, we'll certainly enjoy the chickens!