The water is the biggest issue. I'm tempted to blame it on the chickens, who are very dumb and who are, after all, the ones actually flinging their litter into it and befouling it (pun unintentional). But blaming creatures whose brains can't be any larger than a pencil eraser isn't getting the crap out of the waterer.
The problem is that we need to get the edge raised up to about "shoulder" high, either by hanging or by propping it up. I've been trying to think of some way to hang it for 15 days with no luck, and I've propped it on half a dozen things, which are either too high (dehydrated chickens), too rickety (flooded chickens) or too low (poop in the water). The thing I have it propped on right now is a pretty good height, but they actually stand on the left edge and dip their butts into the water. I'm not sure if this is because they are rock stupid, or because they are taunting me. Either way, it's not working. Our next plan is those cheap red garden bricks. Wish us luck.
The feeder seems to be okay for the moment (yes, that is an empty Diaper Genie refill it's sitting on; the tuna can was too tippy). Of course, they're going to get taller and start climbing all over it again. But at this point I'm sort of thinking they're only going to be in there for another week and a half or so. Let them have their fun. They don't seem to poop in the food, anyway.
And our final issue: the chance of escape. I tried to rig up a cover for the container out of chicken wire yesterday, but that stuff is impossible to work with. Now I'm thinking an old window screen would work pretty well, but of course I haven't got one. Hopefully I have a few more days to work on it before we have to fish chickens out from under the kitchen sink.
Chicken Portrait: Marlo, Prop Joe, Avon and Stringer. Marlo in particular is really fledging out a lot.
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