Our Animals and Their Spaces

I've been thinking a lot about animal spaces this week, mainly because our three adorable goslings are now almost as tall as their Mum, who is a chicken, so they will need a more suitable place to call their own very soon.  We've looked up the cost of Goose Houses and can't really commit to £440 to buy one to match our current henhouses.  So plans are being drawn up by Lovely Hubby to replicate them using the wood that we currently have at the side of the shed. He's even promised me a little heart shaped window!!

Geese don't like to walk up ramps to get to their house and even if they did they would not be able to duck down low enough to get through the henhouse door once they are older.  As it is they have been moved back from the Eglu to the Broody House as it has a bigger sleeping area.  (The Eglu has a nest like bowl for a Mummy bird and her chicks to sleep in, the Broody House has the whole space of the interior floor for sleeping....and boy do this little trio need space.) During the day they are now free range with the chickens and have been accepted with open arms wings!  I'm really pleased about this they will be perfect 'guards' for the chickens when they are fully grown, as geese can be very aggressive to outsiders, they make wonderful 'guard dogs' and are used on many farms as such.

One thing the Goose House will need that they don't normally have is a roosting bar, after all Mum will most likely still want to join her babies in their new home at night.  LH hopes to start making this at the weekend and then they will move in the week after that if he can get it finished.  He's a bit of perfectionist this lovely man of mine and likes to do a job properly, thinking, planning, sorting, designing and then the making.  Very unlike me with,' I know I have an idea, lets do it NOW!!

Together we get most things done, it's called teamwork.

The other animals have claimed back their spaces after being away for the weekend,  Rosy sleeps by the boiler, she loves the background warmth she gets and the privacy of her little corner.

Suky likes her cooler corner sometimes, yes, I know her bed seems much too small for a big Pug, it's her puppy bed but she loves it so much we've left it out for her to use when she wants to.

Her 'grown up' bed is on the other side of the boiler to Rosy and she does sleep in there when she wants to. 

Sophie has her big doggie bed next to the tall fridge freezer and can be found in there occasionally, when the others haven't all climbed in to sleep together.  But Sophie likes to sleep on a hard cool floor, so the laminate is perfect for her, how she sleeps comfortably with her old doggie bones on such a hard surface I'll never know, but each to their own I always say.  She knows what she wants, but when she is feeling off colour or simply feeling her age (she's 13 now, a good age for a Border Collie) she will plonk herself into her bed and not let anyone join her.

The cats of course have 'Cat Terrace' although at the moment only two are occupied on a regular basis, Toby went missing just after my Dad died and hasn't been seen since, and Muffin, our other 'adopted' cat is preferring to spend his days living with the lady next door and her animals.  Ginger loves his little bed in the terrace and can be found most days curled up in number 4.

That is of course when he's not set up temporary home in a box!

Do your animals have their own space?

Back tomorrow, hopefully with some photos of the Goslings.

Sue xx