How to fully automate your chickens
October 7th, 2009
It’s easy to convert your chicken house to be fully automated and the result is a pet that pays for itself with eggs yet takes next to no daily care.
I used the VSB automatic chicken house door system with a 24hr timer and three sliding doors connected by pulleys. One door was for the chickens, one for the ducks and a third closed off a gravity fed feeding chamber.
To provide fresh water for the duck pond and the drinker I used a Hozelock Ac1+ automatic watering module.
I was then able to monitor the entire set up from anywhere in the world via the internet thanks to a Y-cam wireless infrared webcam mounted on a diy swiveling base made from bits I had found lying about.
My decision to try and make our chickens and ducks fully automated came just before we headed off for a three week holiday. We decided that rather than paying someone to come each day we would invest the money in fully automating them with automatic doors, an on-demand feeder, fresh water and a diy swiveling web-cam to keep an eye on it all . Since taking the plunge, the system has operated flawlessly for over a year without even needing the batteries changed so I thought it was worth sharing how I transported our birds to Chicken house Nirvana. Read on to find out how I tackled it.
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