It's my garden "weedeater"..... I have posted about it in the past.
My garden area is next to my old chicken coop/pen/run... I plant in wide rows, 5 rows per bed, then let the chickens "weed" my walkways.
I made a tunnel using pvc, garden hoops and chicken wire. The chickens are able to come into the tunnel, eat the weeds in the walkway then go back into their pen.
I close the little trap door in their fence, move the "weedeater" to the next walkway, open the door there and the chickens "weedeat" that walkway for me, and on and on...... It takes about 5 to 10 minutes per walkway.
The hens are happy, I'm happy... it works for me.
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28 comments:
That rocks!
Thanks Bushidoka!
It works pretty well. :)
We have our first garden this year and I was just telling JP that I need more mulch because of the weeds. WOW! Is this any relation to the chicken tractor or are they in a coop and their runs are movable? At any rate, this idea is really cool.
Thank you Mrs JP!
Congratulations on your first garden, hope it goes well for you! :)
This weedeater isn't really related to a tractor. A chicken tractor has a mini-coop built in with it's own pen. The whole thing is moveable.
I've got something similar that I call my "baby pen".
It's a moveable pen made from chicken wire and PVC... I have used it for lambs, chickens, ducks, geese, rabbits. etc..
I will try to post a picture of it soon. :)
Thanks again and good luck with your garden. :)
I've seen this earlier on in your blog Jeanie, but I gotta say it does look like a good idea. Kinda multi function. The weeds are gone, the chickens are fed, and the garden has a brand new batch of fertilizer on it. Kinda like a weed and feed system.
Jeanie
Very creative idea,makes for good bbq at the end of growing season too. lol What did you plant? I have a small 10 x20 area, that this year gonna plant some mirai corn,maters,garlic and peppers.
Have a Great Day ;)
OTT
one other question - what's in the coffee cans around your garden? I just want to go thru the screen and get a tour it's so pretty!
Thanks Mark! :)
It works out well for me. I like to put the chickens to work in the garden.
In the fall I put tractor scoops full of used barn straw/manure in the garden, then sprinkle the top of each pile with a little bit of grain.
When I turn the chickens into the garden area, they climb up on top of the straw piles and start scratching and flinging the sraw/manure all over the place.
It takes about a week for them to spread the piles out for me. :)
They're happy and I'm happy cause I do not have to spread the manure myself. :)
Thanks OTT!
Your garden sounds great!
This year I planted 20 tomatoes, several jalapeno, anaheim, bell and cayenne peppers,.Yellow squash, zuchinni, cucumbers, okra, green beans, sugar snap peas, mixed lettuces, spinach, leeks, onions,....shoot, that's all I can think of right now. lol
Hope your garden does well for you!
Thank you again Mrs JP!
The cans have peppers and there are rows of lettuce planted around them.
The plants on the left are three rows of bush beans with two rows of onions planted in between.
I like to plant root crops in between my bush plants. lol
Very nice garden ya got there....like your weedeaters too...great idea!!
grothe
Hey Gene..Thanks!
Hope you are having a great Wednesday! The weeks almost over...yeah! lol
Jeanie,
You are quite the farm girl, your garden is comming along quite nicely
Your comment from above:
"I like to plant root crops in between my bush plants." You kill me....;} lolololol Its a good thing I have a koozie around the bottle, or I would be picking up glass off the floor. lol
lolol Ken!
Hope you are doing well!! Bet you're keeping busy these days!
Great use of your resources!
I've considered the possibility getting some chickens in our holler, but then I remembered Mrs. JP's tender heart. Fresh chicken eggs are great, and when the chicken quits laying eggs, most folks just consign the chicken to the soup pot and get another young layer. Not with Mrs. JP. She would name them all, then they would quit laying and we would wind up feeding a bunch of chickens that don't lay eggs. She wouldn't allow me to, umm, "prep" any of them. I decided to get some peach trees and blueberry bushes instead, because if they quit producing, Mrs. JP won't care if I slaughter them to make room for new producers.
Of course, I suppose if you are getting garden weedeating service out of them, that's something to justify the chicken feed...
Thank you JP!
I bet if you got a flock of hens, you'd enjoy them! :) Think of them as bug eaters too. lol Mine roam around the farm yard eating all sorts of bugs, which cuts down on feed costs. Mine get a bit of grain at the end of the day.
They are fun to watch. :)
Hope you give them a try sometime JP! :)
Everytime I come to this blog, it makes my heart smile.
Ken
Ken, what a nice thing to say. Thank you! :)
Hey I haven't checked your blog lately, shame on me. I like this ides for the chicken run and weed eating. Next year we are moving our chickens and I shall keep this in mind. Our family is growing and we need more veggies to go to the grandkids home. More means more work and if I can enlist the hilp of the yardbirds so much the better.
Hi David, good to see ya!
Hope you give the weedeater a try. It works pretty well. :)
I bet your garden is nice!!
That is very smart!
Thank you Becky! It works great. :)
LOL, you always seem to put a smile on me face! Im glad the hens were happy.
lol Thanks LT, I'm glad you liked my weedeater!
The hens do love it. :)
Just remember that if the hens arnt happy, no ones happy!
lol So true! :)
Very cunning! JP - how about some broilers (is that what you call the heavy eating birds in the US?). If you get 100-day broilers but let them free range they will grow slower but still outgrow a normal bird by miles and you know they are destined for the pot from the outset. We have a couple which were particularly friendly so were kept and are now two.
:) Thank you! I raise meat chickens too... they all roam the farmyard and roost in the old coop at night. Right now they are getting fat on grasshoppers.
When I need to weed the walkways, I pen them up in the chicken yard, then turn them into the tunnels.
It works out nice for me.
Thanks again Anonymous, I appreciate you stopping by! :)
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