Turkey Coop, 8

Making a door was one of the last things I had to do for the turkey coop. It just so happens that the chicken coop has two doors. I borrowed one, temporarily, for the turkey coop.


I had a piece of sheet metal that was the original door that came with the shed kit. I screwed that over the opening. It's ugly but will keep predators out until I can replace the door.


The chicken door looks a little twee in the context of the turkey coop.

I also hit my head on the top a couple times. It will be nice to get a taller door in here at some point.


The other things I need to finish before moving the turkeys up was to fill in all the openings that a critter could get through. There were gaps between the rafters above the top plate that I filled with 2x4s


I added hardware cloth at the base to inhibit digging.


And I filled in the gaps between the back wall and the hill.


The mesh was just held on with staples so I covered the ends with particle board to hold it down. I'll replace it later with something more durable and better looking.

My goal was to make the coop safe enough to move the turkeys up. I can paint and finish all the details before the rain starts in the fall.

They aren't crazy about being picked up. Here's one of the blue slate toms.


Here he is in the new coop. I think his head is so red because he was pissed. I still hadn't cleared all of the scraps out yet. I just wanted to get them moved.


Next came the only hen out of the four. She was similarly unsettled by my laying hands on her.


I managed to bring the last two up together. I would guess that they are about half as big as they will eventually get but they already seem so big to me. I'm glad that they have room to flap and run around.


You can see the gaps at the base that I still needed to fill in. I filled in dirt on the inside and added dirt on the outside to the same incline of the hill. Eventually I'd like the floor of the coop to be level but I'll have time to do that later.


Alex has decreed that there will be no more building projects for the rest of the summer. I think he's sick of me spending every weekend, all weekend up on the hill. I'm sick of it too. It will be nice to spend some time in the garden instead :)

Alex has also identified which turkey will be the first dinner. It's the one that did this to him:

We were trying to show the turkeys the roost where they can sleep off the ground. It turns out they have little velociraptor claws. Fine, they can sleep on the ground.