Duck house: building doors

Some more progress on the duck house project.

I bought a special water dispenser for the ducks (when they’re grown). Ducks have slightly different needs than chickens, in that they need to dip their large bills in water to drink and eat. This waterer has three removable cups for drinking (though one will be unreachable in the corner), a reservoir, and a built-in thermostatically-controlled heater, so the water doesn’t freeze in winter:

Duck waterer & camera

Since the waterer was a bit bigger than expected, I also raised the camera up a bit. Here’s the view from the camera:

View from camera

I tried a bag of feed in the cupboard, to see how well it’d fit. Seems to work laying down or standing up, about as well as I expected. Storing a bag or two of food there will make it easier to refill the food jug:

Trying food in cupboard

On to the door trim:

Door trim

Here’s one of the cupboard doors, with 1×2 trim around the edges. The plywood sticks out a bit on the right edge (in the foreground in this orientation), so it covers the gap between the two doors. Which of course means the other (right-hand) door has to be opened first, which is by some strange coincidence the one I expect to open most:

Door trim

Both cupboard doors:

Cupboard doors

I paused for a picnic lunch in the back of the shop (yes, it was still very cold):

David

Adding trim to the maintenance doors:

Cupboard doors

I changed my mind about the design of the maintenance doors. Originally I was going to have a single large outer door, with a vertically split inner door. I decided that a single outer door would be too large, so considered doing double doors like the cupboard, but then realized I could combine the inner and outer doors into one set. So I made four-part doors, again with plywood covering the gaps between the doors:

Maintenance doors

The way it is configured, I can undo one bolt (to be added after painting) to open just the top-left door for a quick peek, or two bolts to open just the top-left and top-right doors to access the ducks without them able to escape (which I expect will be especially useful when they are ducklings), or one bolt to open just the left two doors together (they’ll be connected with a bolt), or the left two and the right two for full access. I think this will be very versatile.

Here’s just the top-left door open:

Maintenance doors

In addition to the bolts, the doors will be held closed with roller catches. The bottom doors will have theirs mounted under the floor, to be out of the way:

Roller catch

And the top doors will have their roller catches mounted above the doors:

Roller catch

Here’s me using an air finish nailer to attach the board for the top roller catches, captured from the duck camera:

Nailing

Next up was adding thin strips of wood to make the doors and walls appear like board-&-batten styling, like I did with the cat house. So the first step was to rip (cut lengthwise) some 1×2 boards into 1×0.5 batten strips:

Ripping boards

I started adding the battens on the cupboard doors:

Board & batten on doors

Then the maintenance doors:

Board & batten on doors

I also added an extra bit of plywood to the corner that will cover up the two small holes between the four doors:

Hole cover detail

Finally (for now), battens on the vent cover:

Board & batten on doors

Next up, I will add the batten strips on the walls, do some extra bracing for attaching electrical stuff, and more caulking. Then I’ll be ready to start painting!

Cat update for week ending March 16

Daylight savings has started (unfortunately… maybe one day we’ll abolish it). But the cats don’t care, other than my tweaking the feeding time slightly.

We had lots of unwelcome visitors this past week, starting with a possum, that visited pretty much every day, and even hung out inside the shelter for about an hour one night:

Possum

The alien orange cat also invaded the shelter:

Orange cat

The orange cat:

Orange cat

But there was plenty of cuteness, as always. Here’s a sideways cat:

Sideways cat

Five cats at breakfast time:

Five cats

A relaxed cat inside:

Cat inside

Cat silhouettes:

Cat silhouettes

Back to the invaders. A raccoon turned up, and a cat left the shelter:

Cat & raccoon

The raccoon came back about an hour later, and was met with disapproval:

Cats and raccoon

Not to be left out, the alien gray cat also turned up:

Gray cat

And the possum again (or another one; who can tell):

Possum

Oh look, another raccoon, this time at breakfast:

Cat and raccoon

Poppy registered a complaint:

Cat and raccoon

Then retreated to the shelter:

Cat and raccoon

I’m getting tired of possums and raccoons turning up, even when there isn’t food there. My main regret about building this shelter is that I didn’t make the entrances in such a way to prevent unwanted guests. Possums and raccoons can climb very well, but they can’t jump quite as far as cats, so making a higher entrance with metal sides to prevent climbing would enable cats to enter, but not possums and raccoons.

I am contemplating modifying the cat house to give such an entrance. One idea was to raise the whole thing up, but that’d have some issues. I’m currently leaning towards enclosing the deck, and making a high entrance in front of the feeder. But of course I won’t have time for such projects until I finish the duck house.

On happier things, two cats outside, one inside:

Cats

Four cats:

Four cats

Cat snuggles:

Cat snuggles

More snuggles:

Cat snuggles

A cat trying to push in at breakfast time, and told to wait their turn:

Wait your turn!

Comfy cats:

Comfy cats

Cat update for week ending March 9

Happy Caturday!

Poppy on the cat house deck, with one of the twins in front:

Poppy & a twin

Three cats:

3 cats

Porcini licking her lips:

Licking

Cat snuggles:

Cat snuggles

Pansy the shop cat:

Shop cat

All five cats snuggled in the shelter:

Cat snuggles

I’m refilling the cat food, and didn’t realize that Poppy was still inside the shelter; you can see her peeking out of the door (I usually try to wait for when nobody is home):

David refilling cat food

Pepper, the other shop cat:

Shop cat

Two cats at night:

Two cats

An alien orange cat encounter:

Orange cat encounter

Orange cat:

Orange cat

Chicken treats in snowy veggie garden

Yet more snow yesterday. Here are some photos of the chickens enjoying some salad treats in the veggie garden:

Chickens in snowy veggie garden

Duck house: building tweaks and trim

Three more days on the duck house project.

Firstly, I bought a much more compact cap for the end of the feeder tube. I want a removable cap, so I can clean out the tube every so often. You can see my original notion on the left, basically the same as I used in the chicken coop, but that clearly would take up too much of the length of the pipe in this situation. So I found a different kind, that adds pretty much no length to the pipe, attaching by expanding a rubber gasket inside the pipe. This will work much better:

Pipe cap

Another purchase was an automatic door opener, the same model I use in both chicken coops. It has a light sensor to open the door at dawn, and close it at dusk, so it needs to be outside. I cut a hole through the front (west) wall, and temporarily installed it (I’ll remove it again when painting):

Automatic opener

Here’s the inside view of the automatic opener and duck door. The opener is screwed from the back onto a couple of bits of wood, such that the string from it hangs inside; later it will be tied to the door. An unusual installation, but means I don’t need any pulleys like on the old coop:

Automatic opener

Next, I made the inner floor, a second floor layer that can be pulled out to aid cleaning out the duck house. It has thin runners on the bottom to reduce friction, and prevent any water from being trapped between the two layers:

Inner floor

Here’s the inner floor in place:

Inner floor

I recently mentioned temporarily using the duck house camera to watch the shop cat Pepper. I retrieved the camera and temporarily clamped it to the house, to determine the best mounting location:

Camera

Here’s the camera view from my preferred location, just inside the maintenance door. This gives a view into the nesting boxes and almost all of the floor space, except the corner under the camera, which is where the water dispenser will be located. (Enjoy the recursive photo of me capturing the view on my iPad):

Camera view

I also tried other camera positions, like the vent side:

Camera view

And behind the feeder tube:

Camera view

But I think the originally planned location by the maintenance door gives the best view.

Since there will be the camera, a heated water dispenser, and a light in the duck house, I drilled a hole near the roof into the storage cupboard for their wires:

Hole for wires

On to the trim work. I added trim around the internal treat door. You can also see the wire hole in the top-right, and below it a notched bit of plywood to cover the hole:

Treat door

I added trim to the edge of the roof. It’ll later have metal drip strip and shingles, like the cat house:

Roof edge trim

Awning trim; the board at the top of the awning isn’t attached yet, as it’ll go on after the shingles, to hide the nails of the top row:

Awning trim

Duck door trim:

Duck door trim

Opener trim:

Opener trim

The big vent on the south wall has a cover that slides vertically. It will be held at various heights by a slide bolt on either side that slides into holes drilled in the trim:

Holes for vent bolts

I glued bits of plywood to the vent cover, to later mount the bolts onto to get the right depth:

Vent cover

The vent cover installed. The notch out of the trim allows the cover to be slid to the left to be removed entirely (which I probably will never do, other than when painting):

Vent cover installed

All the roof, corner, and door surround trim are now installed. I still need to do the trim on the doors themselves, and the fake board-and-batten styling.

Let’s take spin around the duck house. Here the east and north sides (cupboard and maintenance doors):

Finished trim

The north and west sides (maintenance and duck doors):

Finished trim

The west and south sides (duck door and vent):

Finished trim

The south and east sides (vent and cupboard):

Finished trim

Finally, I did a bit of caulking of the joins:

Caulk

Cat update for week ending March 2

Some interesting encounters this week at the cat house.

But first, a couple of cats looking out of the shelter; I enjoy the eyes in the window:

Cats looking out of shelter

Cats snuggling:

Cats snuggling

Yet more snow:

Snow

A pile of all five cats in the shelter:

Cats in the shelter

A couple of cats watching a raccoon:

Cats watching raccoon

A “SLOW, WATCH FOR FERALS” sign in the driveway, flecked with snow:

Slow, watch for ferals sign

Snow:

Snow

A cat with snow on their back:

Snowy cat

Did you watch the video on YouTube of cats playing in the snow?

Another raccoon encounter. This time Poppy had enough, and went out of the shelter to hiss and swipe at the raccoon, and then retreat back to the safety of the shelter:

Raccoon encounter