OK, so it’s not quite a climbing frame, but it does involve several different branches and a ladder, so it’s about as close as you’re going to get.

Our chickens have been doing so well lately. They’ve been laying like never before, and we decided they deserved more of a treat than just their daily portion of scraps.

We’ve had some long branches stacked behind the chicken compound for about a year now, having cut them from an oversized elm tree last year. They’re the perfect thickness to make a nice chunky perch for a chicken, and some of them are forked, so ideal as a support.

I picked the strongest of the forked pieces and cut it down to size so that after digging a little hole in the floor of the compound I could wedge it in between the floor and one of the roof struts, then secured the top with a single long nail. It wasn’t going anywhere.

Then I took another of the branches and laid it horizontally between the y-shaped join in the vertical branch and the lattice that they currently use to climb up when they want a better look down the garden. Again, I secured it with a couple of nails and then I tied yards of string around all of my joins to make sure they weren’t going anywhere.

It was surprisingly easy and all done in about half an hour, ready for testing by the chickens.

To say they loved it would be a bit of an exaggeration. To be honest I’m not sure they knew what to do with it, despite having a couple of similar perches much closer to the ground already. I’m hoping that after a few days of living with it they’ll get used to it, though, and head up there on their own.

Until then we’ll just keep lifting them.

Related posts:

1. Our chickens are moulting heavily
2. The chickens go back undercover
3. Mucking out the chickens