Anyone following our blog has heard us lamenting over the fact that we lost 39 laying hens to minks over a year ago. Though long ago, it is still fresh on my mind. Under cover of darkness, those murderous minks crept onto our property from neighboring rice and crawfish ponds, burrowed under the hen house walls where the hens all roost at night, popped up in their safe resting place and killed them.
Since that time, we've locked all our hens up in rabbit hutches that are completely off the ground and protected by hardware cloth. Each night when they get in there to roost, we put the latch on to ensure their safety. The trouble is, it is cramped in those cages for 40-something birds to fit comfortably. It was high time to 'mink-proof' the hen house.
I'm 58 years old. I'm not an elderly person, but I'm not a spring chicken, either. Every so often, I throw out my lower back. My plan to mink-proof the hen house was to pour concrete all across the floor. This would prevent the minks from tunneling in (unless they had jack-hammers). Pouring concrete, however, is laborious and hard on the back. All that mixing and shoveling. There has to be a better way. Turns out there is.
Dry pouring concrete. That's the ticket and I'll show you how its done. I measured the floor of the henhouse and used an on-line concrete calculator to determine how many 80 pound bags of concrete mix I would need. Then I used a wagon to move the bags close to the hen house.
I split the project into 3 parts since this is a working hen house. Hens are in and out all day long laying eggs and I didn't want to disturb them. I made a crude form, using 2 x 4's and first poured the section you see directly under the roosting bars at the far end of the building.
On the second day, I did a shorter section under the smaller roosting bars right up to the nesting boxes.
And the third day, I finished up the section underneath the roosting boxes, right up to the door of the structure. The photo below shows how I've worked my way out of the building. It shows the process, too. All that concrete you see below is powder. It is dry concrete that I've poured out of the bag and used a rock rake to spread it, 2 1/2 inches deep across the floor area. Then I use a 2 x 4 to screed the dry concrete until it is level as possible. Working my way out of the building so I don't paint myself into a corner, you can see how it's done.
Finally, when its all dry poured, NOW you apply water. First, setting your sprayer to the MIST setting, you mist the concrete powder until it has changed colors.
Then, you come back in an hour, set your hose sprayer setting to the "shower" setting and spray pretty liberally. Repeat the same thing in an hour and then repeat again in another hour. Then you are done. The next day, you can remove the forms and your hens are good to go. So easy. No back-breaking mixing or shoveling.
We began moving the hens back in the henhouse last night. We're pleased with how it came out, but the proof is in the pudding. Can the dry pour concrete defeat the bloodthirsty minks? Time will tell.
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