Cleaning Out the Chicken Run

It was beautiful this past weekend, so we decided to start to tackle a few of the things that we were...err... a little overdue on around the yard.

At the top of the list were prune the fruit trees and clear out the brush and fallen leaves/pine needles between the tree line and the fence that divides our yard from the farm next door. The pine straw/leaves are so thick we sink up past our ankles in spots and we've found all sorts of, uh, fun stuff from the previous owners buried in it the few times we've started the project in the past.

Used cat litter. A rusted old bicycle. A shovel whose handle had been devoured by bugs. Sharp rusted pieces of metal. Several deflated balls and other toys. Plastic bags full of leaves. Buried in the leaves. (what?)

Well, we didn't get to the meat of that task this weekend because we decided to try to do most of that while Acorn is sleeping due to the assorted weird and at times unsafe things we've found. Instead, Joe decided to start clearing out what we assume was the chicken run that goes along with the coop we've been using as a garden shed for the past 5 years.

It was a lot of work getting it cleared out. Joe had to cut down a few small trees that had grown over the past few years. We pulled up a lot of kudzu roots and raked out and bagged up the leaf litter. In paper bags. That we'll most likely toss in to our massive fire pit one night. Luckily, we had a third set of hands up to the task of helping us out.

Acorn didn't let his small hands get the better of him, he was raking (sort of), throwing the big sticks on the outside of the fence, and bagging leaves right along with us.

Foreman Luna keeping a close eye on the situation.

There's still a bit of work to be done back there - the fence needs fixing in places and 2 new doors need to be built. Then we have to turn the shed back in to a coop with nesting boxes and such. Then, I suppose, we'll finally get those chickens we've been talking about forever. :)

P.S. If I didn't say anything, you'd have no idea that I live in a subdivision with access to all of the major highways and shopping areas 15 or so minutes away, would you? Our yard feels like a magical little secret to me, and I love coming home to it after traveling through the insane traffic and hustle that's just past the end of the road.