Omlet, a UK company specializing in smartly designed chicken coops, has announced the “Eglu Cube,” an even larger model than the original Eglu that can support up to 10 chickens (if you add the optional 3-meter wire run). The Eglu Cube is wheeled to make moving it around the yard simple, while the curved, nook-less surfaces make it simple to hose out while also helping to prevent infestation of red mites.
The wire chicken run extensions also feature a guarantee—”No Foxes Allowed”—by way of a fiendishly clever addition of about six inches of wire that extends flat from the bottom of the fence, making it difficult for burrowing animals to gain entry. (Unless they were smart enough to start digging a tunnel, a la The Great Escape, but my guess is most foxes aren’t big Steve McQueen fans. James Garner—ironically—has a huge follow in the marmot community.)
Hens are sustainable, fairly easy to take care of, offer great natural fertilizer, and are surprisingly unobtrusive in even suburban settings. Most communities will allow residents to keep at least a few egg-laying hens (although rarely roosters). I don’t know if the Eglu Cube will ever be available in the States, but even if you can’t get your protein-craving hands on one, building a coop isn’t all that difficult. And certainly cheaper than the £425 – £695 price of the Eglu Cube—if not quite as cute.
Product Page [Omlet.co.uk via Treehugger]
Way too small for 10 chickens, and pricey too. If you’re enough of a do-it-yourselfer to raise chickens, building a proper coop certainly shouldn’t be beyond you.
Urban chicken coop? I should get one of these for the family in the apartment building next to mine. I mean, it’s weird to wake up to the rooster crowing right here in a major metropolis, but if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em, right?
Points for the self-sufficiency and cuteness factor, but points off from the crucible of reality. Having many people raise a few chickens is an infectious disease nightmare. One of the reasons that the current avian flu (which after all does have apocalyptic potential) is so difficult to eradicate in southeast Asia is the large number of “at home” chickens. These can neither be adequately monitored, nor vaccinated, nor eradicated when wild birds stopping by to share their rations pass along the virus to Chicken Little and his owner’s kids.
Bad idea! Bad, bad, bad!
No raccoons in Old Blighty? Huh, I guess Pom-Poko War is not quite as surreal for you guys.
(To the uninitiated – Myazaki‘s “Pom-Poko War” features Japanese Tanuki or “Raccoon Dogs” (Nyctereutes procyonoides viverrinus) as protagonists. In English translations the word Tanuki is invariably translated as “raccoon”, and since in North America raccoons are not commonly believed to have enormous magical testicles this leads to extreme high weirdness!)
Tigerbomb @ 8: You may not have raccoons yet, but don’t let your guard down.
Here in the heart of Oakland, our raccoons are fat and sassy… and occasionally seem alarmingly clever. I wouldn’t put it past them to figure out how to hitch a ride across the Channel. *cue ominous music*
As a British company, I imagine they overlooked the raccoon issue due to the fact that we don’t have raccoons. We do however, have people who like re-enacting concentration camp scenes with hookers and I don’t know if they’ve taken that into account.
The hens that lay the eggs I buy in the supermarket have more room than the ones pictured above. Why bother keeping your own when you treat them like this? This sucks.
“Chicken tractors” like this are great for fertilizing the yard & garden, reducing soil grubs, etc. but raising chicken’s isn’t as neat and tidy as the picture suggests.
And while preventing foxes from digging under is a good thing, you also have to prevent raccoons from sticking their little hands (yes raccoons have hands, don’t let anybody tell you different)through the wires and pulling the chickens out a piece at a time. It’s pretty disgusting to see what a full grown raccoon can do to a chicken through a wire fence, particularly when the chicken is still walking around the next morning with most of its entrails missing.
–Charlie
We have 4 chooks in suburban Brisbane. They are quiet, easy, and having fresh eggs is tasty. Their pop makes great fertilizer for the garden, too.
My neighbor has one of these… Cool but way overpriced !! She lets the chickens out during the day and put them back in for the night to avoid foxes…
She didn’t mention the evil racoons…
Home-based chicken-raising is actually *not* a public health problem–bird flu is present in Asian home flocks because poor people save money by buying chickens from commercial chicken producers who sell off their sick birds. Purchasing birds from a reputable hatchery and following basic sanitation practices (handwashing, mostly) makes keeping an urban flock quite safe.
Also, a surprisingly large number of urban areas allow chicken-raising with a few limits–here in Austin, the coop must be 40 feet from neighboring homes. In my neighborhood, (just a couple of miles from downtown) there are at least five flocks, enough that our roosters can hear each other crow and can call back and forth.
About the Eglu: looks nice, but it’s expensive and pretty small for 10 chickens. Much better to build your own.
The company’s name is Omlet? Oh I LOLed until I cried.
Raise a couple of chickens while staving off red mites and the avian flu? Sounds like good clean fun for the kids.
It’s true.
One time I overheard a guy say something negative about The Rockford Files and a marmot was on him so fast I couldn’t believe it.
Probably the reason he tends to be a bit smug when appearing in perso,,,pghx,fvn