How big is your duck door?

[andreacroyle]

Definitely helpful, thank you! What do you have down for flooring in your secure daytime pen? Can't quite tell from the pictures. This looks like a really nice setup!

The base framing is double stacked pressure treated 4x4's, inside the framing we layed down weed barrier, covered with 3" of 3/8" river stone, then put a layer of 3'x4' heavy plastic shipping pallets (for air space), finally all covered with 1" thick rubber horse stall mats - what you see in the pics.

The stone and plastic pallets were to securely bring the floor level up (nothing is going to dig up through all that!), the rubber horse stall mats are a duckie foot friendly surface that is easy to hose clean.

The rear framing trim is gapped 1/2" above the mats, so that the duckie dirt can be hosed straight out the back, where I installed a PVC rain gutter to collect and direct the dirty water out away from the pen.

Today I installed a timer operated self cleaning wash system for the pen using some garden sprinkler bits....and a pool filling shower for the inside pool.

Will post pics later, if interested (at work now)

Cheers

Dan

Wow! Your duck house makes me feel like mine is inadequate. What a great job you have done with yours. I would love bigger pics of the inside. and specs of your feeding pvc tubes and to know what kind of bedding you used in the nighttime coop. is that 1/2 hardware cloth? I absolutely love the self cleaning hose idea! you said there is a gap for the poo water to run into the gutter? how did you make it predator proof?

 

[tdd2]

Sorry so long a reply, trying to answer all your questions accurately . . .

Thank you for your compliments! It was my first attempt at building a structure, and is still a work in progress (isn't everything!?!)


Here are two pics of the inside of the night time 'barn'. The barn section is 5' deep, front to back (including the nesting boxes on the front) by 6' long, and 5' high at the higher front. It was built and sold by a local shed company as a chicken coop. I took out the lower roost bar, and used the upper roost bar to make a storage shelf with a bit of plywood. I also removed three of the nesting separators to allow for 3 larger 'sleeping' areas - and they use them



The bedding is made of 'fine' pine chips - not shavings, but the kind of small, consistently sized chips you'd get from a radial saw at a saw mill. We buy it at our local AGWAY. Very easy to clean, and makes sifting 'duckie dumplings' out in the morning much easier using a litter box scoop.











The PVC gravity feeder tubes were my better half's contribution, something she found online, and we adjusted for our needs.

Working down from the top of each:

They have 3" heavy black rubber caps (for keeping moisture/bugs out) that make filling easy. (sold with a hose clamp, that isn't used here)

The main bodies are 24" long, 3" diameter PVC tubes, glued to 3" to 2" adapters at the bottom of the tube.

A 2" long piece of 2" diameter PVC is glued into the bottom of the 3"-2" adapter, and that in turn is glued into the top of a 2" 'Y', allowing a place to feed from.

There is a flexible red rubber cap that covers the feeder tube during the night when they are locked up in the barn (again, for moisture and bug control) - this part had to be special ordered as I wanted something that snugly covers the outside diameter of the feeder, and the needed 2 3/4" diameter I.D. isn't a standard size.

We end at the bottom with a threaded 2" plug adapter piece and threaded cap at the bottom, so that the bottom threaded cap be removed to thoroughly clean the feed tubes.

They are mounted to the pen with standard 3" plastic pipe hangers, and can be popped out of the hangers for cleaning.

All of the parts (aside from the red rubber feed tube caps) were obtained off-the-shelf at Lowes, and for roughly $30.

So far, with the two duckies, they go through about 1/2 of one tube every 2 days - I tend to top it up when it's about 1/2 full, on alternate days.

The second tube isn't used unless we are away for a couple days - between the two tubes, the 5 gallon water feeder, the inside pen pool, and now the timer watering system - theoretically, we could go away for 7-10 days and only require the neighbors to look in on them daily, but not to have to unlock/open the pen.




As for the predator protection, yes - it is 1/2" welded, galvanized and black vinyl coated hardware cloth all around. It is stainless stapled to the main framing, then sandwiched between the main framing and screwed on trim layers of wood framing. We bought the fencing online from Academyfence.com in 50' x 48" wide rolls.


The self watering system was really to keep the pen clean, and make sure fresh water is added to the pool often when we are gone on the occasional weekend . . . it only cleans the area around the pool (about 2/3 of the pen area), but that's where they spend their time, so that's where it's most needed.

And lastly, the gap across the back for waste water flow is 1/2" high from the 4x4 frame base to the bottom of the 2x4 fencing support.

Between the size of the gap, and the thickness of the 2x4 outer main frame combined with the 1x4 inner trim piece (roughly 3" thick combined) - it's going to be very difficult for anything to get even a little paw through there. The hardware cloth also hangs into that gap most of the way across (sandwiched between the 2x4 frame and 1x4 inner trim).



The gap looks bigger in this picture, because it's wet (getting some reflection), and I'm looking at it straight on. You can see the gutter running along the base of the pen. I also have a rain gutter along the top of the sloped steel roof to keep mud from splashing up during heavy rains to a minimum:



You can see the downspout on the right, draining the upper rain gutter into the lower dirty water gutter exit - the drain from both runs out into the wooded area next to our yard.

Hope that helps!

Cheers'

Dan