Animal antics
February 14th, 2008 - Posted in chickens, ducks, sheep - by Sarah|
Our farmyard has had its moments during the last few weeks and has provided much needed entertainment and diversion from the seemingly endless task of putting our purlins on. Ahab is very happy as we have exchanged our young cockerel for one of next door’s pullets (a young hen) so his harem has finally increased by one.
The new pullet.
We’re not having much luck on the chick front though and we sometimes worry about Ahab’s suitability as a sire. Many of the eggs we’ve tried to hatch weren’t fertile and we have caught him sitting in a nesting box occasionally (although I personally think that this is because it’s the only way he can catch our extremely liberated hens). Still, they are all mostly happy and enjoying our cucumbers and seeding cauliflowers very much. Fatty is looking a bit run down and has a couple of bald patches as she persists in spending every night directly underneath the higher roosting pole and as a consequence gets pooed on and bugs find her very attractive. We treat them all with Derris Dust occasionally as a bug repellent but I think I am going to have to make some more permanent change to the roosting pole set up so that they can’t sit directly above her.
Those of you have been following our blog from the beginning may remember the story of Humpy, the chick. Well now we have Stumpy, the ugly duckling who should have died weeks ago but who has somehow managed to struggle on. People look at our ducks and say “Oh, isn’t the little baby one sweet!” Their expressions change when we tell them that he is that same age as the other 3.
Stumpy (on the right) enjoying a swim.
He just seemed to stop growing around Xmas time and has never developed proper feathers. He hobbles rather than walks and constantly treads on his own feet and falls over. As he has got older he has really got the hang of pushing himself back up with his beak. When he was younger though he sometimes just got stuck and Brendhan found him one morning shivering under some reeds. I thought that he was able to handle himself better now until I went down to them a few days ago and found him upside down in a hole with his legs waving in the air. He may have been there for ages as he had trouble walking at all when I rescued him. I took him down to the stream for a therapeutic swim. He seems to enjoy just standing in the water too, presumably because he doesn’t need to worry about balancing. The main reason that he’s still alive after all this time has to be the care and attention his siblings give him. They dash all over the place but always go back and wait for him to right himself and catch up (quacking amongst themselves the whole time).
In the sheep paddock Mittens has been developing his role as chief trouble maker. He has managed to break one horn off by sticking his head through the fence to eat the grass on the other side and then pulling it out too fast.
What a lady-killer!
I managed to catch him to clean his forehead with disinfectant and it’s growing back already. I think this makes him look like a pirate – or that may just be his behaviour. He has recently discovered, with great interest, that Hat and Scarf are female and they are getting a bit annoyed by his hassling them. Since the Leicesters arrived the sheep have spent most of their time in separate groups as though they weren’t sure that they were all the same species. Mitten’s behaviour seems to be acting as a catalyst for the others to band together, possibly as the one sheep that he still obeys is Cardigan.
We were hoping to have our Jersey heifer by now but she is no longer coming. The owner had her and some other calves out with a contract grazer who had been putting them in very thin pasture (in drought-stricken Canterbury) and she was in no condition to travel to us. We have decided to leave getting our house cow until next year and hold out for a Belted Galloway instead of a Jersey.
Truss details
February 2nd, 2008 - Posted in eco-building - by Sarah|
Unfortunately when our trusses were delivered we were still working on plumbing and fixing the walls so we weren’t able to have them lifted directly onto the top plate by the truck. Plumbing is still done using the old fashioned plumb line (a string with a weight on the end) as over the height of the wall this is far more accurate than a spirit level. We plumbed each of the corners in both directions and then nailed them together. Then had a go at straightening the top plates by running a taut string from one end to the other and ensuring that the distance between it and the top plate remained the same all the way along its length. Where it wasn’t we used props connected to pegs to push or pull it to where it should be. The sledge hammer came in handy occasionally too! Once everything was straight we tightened up the metal bracing straps on the walls and were at last ready to raise the trusses.
We have got three different kinds of truss – one plain gable end truss at the back, nine standard trusses in the centre and one structural gable end truss at the front.
The south gable end truss with its vertical struts has a bottom chord only 100mm high as it rests on the top of the rear wall all along its length.
The trusses are made from H3 treated pine because the sprocket ends that form the eaves poke out 900mm beyond the walls and will remain exposed to the elements when the building is finished. The council are only happy for Lawson Cypress to be used in exposed situations where they are not structural eg board and batten cladding. The quality of the wood in the trusses is pretty awful, especially when compared to our wall timber but there’s not much we can do about it. The house will have rafters (ie a framed roof) rather than pre-fabricated trusses and as these will be completely enclosed we will be able to use untreated Lawsons.
We lifted the trusses up onto the roof and let them hang point down. Then we moved them into position one at a time and lifted them upright. We made sure that they were sitting directly over the wall studs and were vertical before attaching them to a temporary purlin near the peak. The purlins are long pieces of timber that run the length of the roof at right angles to the trusses. Then we used CPC40’s ( L-shaped metal purlin cleats) to attached the ends of the trusses to the top plate.
A CPC40 connecting the truss to the top plate.
We have also had to put tie downs (yet more metal straps) onto the top of each stud that a truss rests on so that a strong wind catching the roof cannot rip the top plate from the wall. Brendhan has suggested that we keep a running tallly of the fixings that we have used in this building as each piece of metal requires at least 9 nails. When someone asks what the building is made from it is very tempting to answer “nails”.
