Last night Early, early this morning, at 3:30 in the way to early for me to be awake part of the morning, the alarms went off for the chicken houses. I got up all bleary eyed and threw a sweat shirt on my oh so not yet awake body and headed outside to the stinky chicken truck to go investigate. I found that the alarm was going off in house number one. The control board there showed the front of the house was 12 degrees too cold. Maybe a heater is out I think to myself. I walked outside along the side of the chicken house in my shorts and sweat shirt combo wondering why I am never more prepared for the cold weather alarms at night. It was about 36 degrees (f) out there and I was freezing. After inspecting the front heater I saw it was definitely not working. Repairing it takes time and more light than I had, so I decided to see what I could do to make the house warmer using the other two working heaters. Back to the control room I went.
In the control room I checked the temperatures again and noticed that the temperature in the middle of the house was also cold, but the heater there was working. That is odd, so I opened the door to look in the house. I saw another problem. A wire that opens and closes the buffers (little windows all along the sides of the house that allow the air in) was broken, so all the front buffers were wide open all the time. Well, that would definitely cause it to be cold in there. It is like heating a room with the windows wide open. I went up to my house to get dressed more appropriately for the weather, then after a crazy search for some tools, one was actually found buried in the litter in a chicken house, I repaired the broken wire.
With the wire repaired I tested it, and found that now the buffers don't open wide enough in the front. That is odd also, so I go investigate. Nothing better than walking through the inside of a chicken house in week seven of a flock. It takes about 30 seconds inside the house before you are fully committed to taking a shower because it is a smell that won't come off. Too late now. I found that the broken wire I just repaired had caused the weight at the other end of the line to pull too hard on the pulley, and pulled that out of the ceiling. At least I had all my tools gathered, so it didn't take too long to repair that problem.
After fixing those two out of the three problems, the temperatures had now all balanced out and were once again within the range I needed them to be. I looked at my clock in the truck and found that it was already almost five a.m. As I had suspected, when I got home T was already awake and waiting for me. I took a quick shower, and headed out to the kitchen with T to start my day. "Can I please have some milk daddy?"
"Yes T. Go sit on the couch and I will get some milk for you and some coffee for me."
I'm going to have to learn to go to bed earlier than midnight. When ever I stay up late something always happens to make me get up early. Luckily, L will be home early today and I will be able to catch a little nap. See it still all works out.
7 comments:
Thank goodness you were able to fix the problems. Hopefully, you can have a peaceful, mellow day.
I totally feel your pain! :)
My hubby is usually the bleary-eyed one that goes after the alarms, but if he's at his other job, guess who gets the honor? Yep, me.
Ahhh, chicken farmin'...there's nothin' like it! :)
This is unrelated to your post ... but ... I just LOVE that family photo of the four of you!!!
Dude, you are so my hero. I would have tons of dead frozen chickens on my hands if I had to get up that early. Here's a suggestion, keep a pair of sweats next to your bed at all times. My oldest dog has a bladder problem so sometimes he wakes me up in the middle of the night cause he really, really, really has to go. I don't relish the idea of standing in front of my house in my underwear (and neither would my neighbors) so I just slip on the sweats as we run to the door.
Are you sure you don't have the Chicken Run chickens, sabotaging stuff??
dunno if you knew this already, but all odors are particulate.... which mean that, yeah, when you're smelling poop, miniscule bits of poop are activating your olfactory nerves.... who knew? who wanted to know?
Oh,that's not so bad. Part of the smell is also from the ammonia given off from the litter. I have had litter thrown into my eyes, and into my mouth many times, I have even had it in my ears. I guess a little in my nose won't hurt me any worse. LOL Ahhh chickens...
Post a Comment