New Feeders

A few days ago, 

my chicken feeder decided to crack.

I kept it together with some baling twine, 

but it eventually just ended up breaking apart.

You can see the broken feeder in the above photo lying on the ground.

This is the before photo.

The new PVC feeders are going to be attached here.

We removed wire and replaced it with a piece of plywood.

This provides a weather barrier for the feeders,

and for the chickens.

It offers a wind break and protection from storms, 

as most of the nasty weather and wind comes from the west.

The ends of the feeders are made of a 90 degree 

and a 45 degree attachment.

The added 45 degree piece prevents the food from spilling out on the ground.

We measure the PVC pipe making sure to leave room

to be able to easily remove the cap at the top to refill.

Inserted the bottom portion of the feeder into the precut holes in the plywood

and glued the PVC pipe into the pieces

(I have no idea what they're called).

Once all the pieces were glued together, 

we used attacher thingies to attach the pipe to the side of the coop.

You'll notice that we placed a piece of scrap wood

(it was a garden stake)

between the upper portion of the pipe

and the coop wall.

This kept the pipe out away from the wall so the cap could be taken off easily.

The finished product

(minus the caps which were put on after filling the pipes).

The two pipes hold almost 1/3 of a bag of feed combined.

We had enough pipe left that we can add a third feeder

once we get all the attachments we need.

I also plan on adding a PVC oyster shell feeder as well, 

but I'll (or more accurately, Big E will) be using thinner PVC.

My overall opinion is that we should have done this sooner.

It is a fairly inexpensive feeder system

(we spent about $30 for the PVC pieces)

and it only took about 20-30 minutes to get it all put together.  

It holds more food than the feeders you purchase at feed stores,

and the food isn't wasted since the chickens can't scratch it out of the tube.

They also can't get the food dirty. 

It also frees up floor space.

There was no problem with the chickens finding or figuring out the new food system either.

Definitely something I'd recommend!