Keeping chickens in the back garden (or other small area) is becoming more and more popular in Europe and the United States.

As people want to do more to protect animal welfare, know more about the origin of their food, and get closer to nature, back garden chicken farming is a great way to do all three of these. If you’re thinking of joining this trend and getting a few chickens of your own, one of the most important decisions you’ll have to make is choosing the best housing for your new flock. After all, your chickens will be spending most of their lives there.

If you want to have contented, healthy birds and be rewarded with that daily egg for breakfast, it’s important to provide your chickens with everything they need. There are so many different sizes, shapes, materials, and designs that housing choices can seem overwhelming.

Your choice will be probably be influenced by cost, available land, and the number of chickens you plan to keep.

While these are important criteria, it’s important to remember just how important good housing is to your flock’s overall health.

The government formed a body called Farm Animal Welfare Council (FAWC) in the UK to review the welfare of farm animals. Their framework is called – The five Freedoms. It gives a logical basis for the welfare of animals.

It is a great help for any would be chicken keeper to make right decisions based on the council’s recommendation. The five points are.

1. Freedom from hunger and thirst. You should have ready access to fresh water. See if the feed containers are properly suspended. Check up whether you and your chicken have access to uncontaminated and fresh water.

2.

Freedom from discomfort. Is the environment and shelter proper? Is there enough space? Is the house where they are sheltered free from dangerous elements? Is it water and wind proof? Are there proper nests and boxes? If the house is made of wood, is the wood treated periodically? Are there harmful fixtures in the house?

3. Freedom from pain injury and disease. You should treat the bird’s sickness quick. Can you clean the bird and the house quick? Is the height proper? Can you take away a bird without hurting it? Is it safe from thieves? Is the floor smooth and is there proper ventilation?

4. Freedom to express normal behaviour. Have you given enough space? Proper company and adequate rooms and boxes and perches are important. Birds should be able to explore, peck and dig.

5. Freedom from fear and distress. You must ensure conditions and treatment which will avoid mental stress.

Safeguarding your chickens from predators is serious business. You need to be certain that any coop or barn in which you let the birds nest will prevent predators from gaining access. You may also want to consider putting the chicken housing in a quiet area of the garden or yard. The fowl is, of course, wholly reliant on the responsibility of the owner to keep them protected and watch out for their welfare. Housing your chickens may be the most important task you have when you keep a flock.

The U.S President Barack Obama’s wife, Michelle Obama, along with students from a local elementary school and numerous world-class chefs picked the fall harvest this week by plucking turnips, sweet potatoes, pumpkins as well as other homegrown goodies. The 1,500 square-area garden, which was planted in the spring of 2009 in White House, has yielded thousands of pounds of products without synthetic fertilizers or pesticides. Those products have served the Obama family, White House guests and the needy at a local food shelter. The First Lady used the project to educate children about the benefits of fresh food.

The U.S President Barrack Obama’s wife, Michelle Obama gathered her fall harvest on Wednesday, October 20

Michelle in a black coat and rubber boots was in the garden

While it was raining, Michelle Obama dug potatoes, pulled turnips and worked with a dozen children who are traditionally invited for harvest day in the White House garden

“You guys have witnessed the first White House pumpkins“, Michelle told the students

The pumpkin is a symbol of Halloween observed on October 31

Ms. Obama posed photos with the children

The U.S. first lady decided to remind the children about the program of improving the quality of food at American schools and reducing fastfood for healthy food

Michelle showed a 2-kilo potato that she had dug up several minutes earlier

After the U.S. First Lady and the children finished gathering the harvest, they came to the White House kitchen to clean the vegetables. The White House cooks saw the harvest and suggested making salads and a soup out of them

Over 700 kilograms of vegetables were gathered and cooked in the White House kitchen. The vegetables and honey from the beehives are used to cook food for the president’s family and official receptions. The garden produces lettuce, spinach, broccoli, cabbage and greens

During his election campaign, Barack Obama focused on supporting agriculture and choosing organic food. His wife also backs healthy food

Related links:

White House officers’ income

Presidential Daughters: White House Weddings

Barack Obama Likes Golf

* Invite Birds: Birdhouses are a superb way to invite birds in your garden. Their chirping lifts spirits and you will be a step closer to nature. Kids will love to see birds visiting them everyday and will enjoy feeding them. Birds will keep coming to your garden if they are comfortable in the house and are fed well.

* Creative Activity: The kit is basically like a blank slate. The craftsman in you has to turn it into a beautiful abode for birds. These make excellent gifts as well. When you visit someone particularly who is fond of environment and nature they would really appreciate such a gift. They make great Christmas gifts too. There are birdhouses available in the market. However, trust me when I tell you that it’s fun to make bird houses on your own using these kits. The joy you get when you see your bird house ready is incomparable. And it will please you even more when happy birds sing for you each day!

Various Bird kits

There are various kits that you can get. Some of them are even bird specific and you can pick the one that is your favorite. Birds kits have instruction manuals, planks with holes drilled to fix them with screws, pack of nails and so on. This will make your assembly quick and convenient. Mostly these kits are made from superior quality wood like cedar that is long lasting and can face all weathers.

You can design bird homes depending on the birds you wish to attract. There are small wren kits that are great for tiny birds that are found all over. If you wish to see Chickadees in your garden, you can design your bird home accordingly. Chickadees are beautiful birds and sing melodious songs. They even pick grains from your hand if you feed them.

The best part is to paint the house once ready. You could go for whatever colors you wish to for the bird house. Birds are attracted to colorful and fancy houses. A good-looking bird house will help to beautify your backyard.

Kids & Bird kits

Even kids can make bird houses using bird kits. It is a great learning activity for them and teaches them to care for the environment. You must encourage a few kids to team up together and make a bird house while you supervise over them. They learn how to work in a team and it stimulates their creative side. It is a great vacation activity. Even for parents and grand parents, it’s a great way of spending time with their kids. Bird house kits are a fantastic way to beautify your garden. Assembling them can be a great fun-filled family activity. You will love the presence of birds in them each morning. It is charming and blissful to hear the sweet chirps of birds every morning.

There are various types of gardening today such as indoor, water gardening, community, and native plan gardening. Moreover, there are other types that are slowly emerging from century-long concealment. The world has waited long enough for such a mystery to unfold.

This great art of gardening, concealed for many years, is called Nihon Teien or Japanese gardening. These are gardens traditionally made to showcase the culture of Japan through limited space and garden container ideas. Today, such art is commonly seen in houses, parks, and landmarks. Buddhist and Shinto Temples also house the best of nature’s grandeur in such limited spaces.

Interestingly, this emerging art famous in European countries was developed from the influences and style of the Chinese gardens.

Nihon Teien as seen today was born in Fujiwara and Heijyo castle towns. The earliest designs highlight Buddhism and Taoism visions by showcasing famous Chinese mountains like the Penglaishan. Ruins of Japanese gardens found in Heijyo castle were found to include a water passage thought to be used in water poetry ceremonies.

One of the interesting developments in Japanese gardening occurred through a Zen Monk named Kokan Shiren. He wrote a rhyme-prose titled Rhymephrose on Miniature Landscape that advanced the art of bonseki and bonsai. The secret art of Japanese gardening was traditionally passed on from sensei (teacher) to apprentice. In fact, Kokan vehemently stated in the book that the writing must never be shown to outsiders and that everything in the book must be kept a secret.

Fortunately, various trade schools supplemented this knowledge as what most people know now today.

Moreover, Nihon Teien involves various styles that may serve as garden design ideas for people who tend their own gardens at home. The first in line is the Tsukiyama where water element is ubiquitous. Tsukiyama recreates the natural scenery of Japan while emphasizing on bodies of water. Ponds embody the lakes and seas, while trees, shrubs and bridges embody the creation of artificial hills, by which Tsukiyama got its name.

Furthermore, Kare-san-sui is a Japanese garden known for its traditional sand and stone elements. Also known as Zenniwa, this is considered the most conceptual form of Japanese garden found in Zen temples. Compared to Tsukiyama, Kare-san-sui includes only raked sand representing water and stones symbolizing gods, animals, or mountains.

Lastly, Japanese culture highly involves tea ceremony that is why a dedicated gardening design exists to complement it. Chaniwa are tea gardens found everywhere in Japan. They are commonly built outside tea ceremony houses to facilitate the “cleansing” of the ceremony attendees. The inclusion, a set of stones where water passes through, is one of the interesting garden design tips other countries adopted from Japan.

A lot of homeowners want to beautify their houses, both inside and out. For the interior, people buy furniture and accessories. Some people also remodel their homes if they are dissatisfied with the look. If they do not remodel, then they just do minor changes like repainting and rearranging. As for the exterior, it is installed with devices that not only add aesthetic appeal, but also provide protection.

Most people even develop gardens to further beautify their properties. Some of them have pools built on their backyards. Others have water features like fountains or waterfalls installed. Outdoor living areas are also popular among a lot of homeowners. With this, they can fully enjoy the outdoors.

Another popular outdoor design idea is growing a garden, which can be a challenging task.

A homeowner must carefully maintain it to preserve its beauty. Growing a garden may involve using different kinds of plants. There are ground covers, climbing plants, and bushes, among others.

When you are looking for ideas on how to design a garden, you must consider what kinds of plants you can use. If you want orchids in your garden, you can do some research so you can choose among the different varieties. Orchids are considered as one of the most exotic plants, and they are relatively easy to take care of. Some people think orchids grow in tropical regions only, but they are actually present in a number of other areas.

An example of an orchid is the Moth Orchid, also known as Phalaenopsis; it is called so because it resembles a large Asian moth that is in flight.

The flowers can come in a variety of colors. While thinking of ideas on how to design a garden, you must also consider how you can care for the plants you have chosen.

Orchids can generally tolerate a lack of water better than a surplus of it, but both still lead to shriveled leaves and slow growth. You can check the roots to know the condition of your orchids. Too much water can cause the roots to rot, while a lack of it makes the roots firm and white. You can adjust your watering schedule to fix this problem. Some orchids also prefer indirect light. Too much or too little light affects the color of the leaves. These information are just a part of how to design garden.

With an aim to provide low cost house designs, House and Plans offers you a complete range of house plans that perfectly suit your requirements, location, and budget. The designers at the company are highly experience and trained in order to meet all your specific requirements. They are capable of developing unique house plans for you. They are with you at every stage ensuring unbiased support and advice.

Earlier, taking advantage of an architect’s services used to be very expensive and getting a house plan made especially on order was simply out of question for an average person. But now, with House and Plans in the market, you can get modern as well as traditional house designs that perfectly fit your requirements. The best part is that they don’t cost much and are designed according to your tastes and preferences. If you require best quality house designs at affordable prices, look no further than House and Plans. The company is able to provide you with exactly what you’re looking for.

What Do House Plans Contain?

A house plan offered by House and Plans contains site plan, floor plan, elevation plan, and cross-sectional details. It outlines each and every detail regarding dimensions of rooms, kitchen, ceiling height, length and breadth of walls, doors and windows, room sizes, cabinets, basement, driveways, walkways, lawns, gardens, and backyards. It also gives details about ridge heights, roof pitches, exterior finishes, and architectural styling.

A house design also contains additional information such as interior architectural styling, foundation plan, locations for footings, framing plan, roof plans, interior elevation, built-in shelves, and so on. They cover some more details like plumbing fixtures, structural layouts of cabinets, moldings and column details, electrical drawings, sockets, switches and fixtures, piping, windows and doors locations, water heaters, furnaces, and sub-floor plan.

Advantages Of House Plans

There are several reasons for getting a house plan made by a professional designer or a company. These plans give you an idea of how much space can be used for construction and how much is to be left. It gives you complete knowledge about how your home will look like after construction. If you don’t like a particular plan, you can always modify it and make required changes before starting to construct.

House and Plans helps you in determining the right layout and structure of your future house. The company works with top designers who are experts in this field. They bring you the finest home designs at lowest price possible. Not only this, they are there with you at each stage of the construction. They offer you thorough guidance and unbiased advice in order to realize your dreams.

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When flowers are planted in a bed, they give the garden a neat, clean and pleasing appearance. The beds are an excellent way of segregating perennials from annuals and bi-annuals. The use of shrubs, bushes, or small flowering trees can be used to mark the borders. Following are a few tips that can help one design garden flower beds.

Building a flower bed requires planning. The first thing that needs to be done is to asses yourself as a gardener. Are you ready to get your hands dirty, whether you plan to hire help, or your interest in flowers is a passing thing. Once you are clear, it would be easy to decide the number of beds, and the kind and the variety of flowers plants one wants. Make a rough sketch of the flower bed, which should contain its length and width size, and visualize the arrangement and the type of flowers you are planning to plant.

Choose a sunny spot which has a good drainage system.

Outline the boundary of the flower bed using nylon ropes. Decide on the shape, it could be a square, rectangle, circle, or any other design. Using a small shovel, dig up the entire bed at least 10 – 15 inches deep, and level and demarcate the soil as per the design. If you plan to include designs that have layers, provide adequate support to the soil to prevent soil erosion while watering. One also needs to take precautionary measures to prevent disease and pests in the soil from damaging the seeds or saplings. Use a good measure of organic composite and pesticide while preparing the soil.

Whether sowing seeds or planting saplings, tall plants should be placed at the back of the bed near the fence, while smaller ones should be planted in the front. For beds that have no fences as their borders, shrubs and bushes, or small plants can be grown as border edgings, with smaller plants inside. Plants that require frequent attention, like pruning, mulching, grooming or spraying, must be always grown where they can be easily accessed. Watering a flower bed should be done carefully. Water should be sprayed equally from all sides, and excess water should have place to drain out.

Flower Bed Ideas
A traditional flower bed uses roses that are planted in borders, and also mixed with small flowering trees, shrubs, perennials and annuals. Another rose bed design includes the use of the same variety of roses in different colors, or vice versa.
While deciding flower colors, make an impact with vibrant colors, and never group dull or light colors with each other. However, this requires a good understanding of the type, size and colors of different flowers. One can even grow different colored foliage to create a dramatic effect, or to subdue too many dark colored flowers.
A raised garden bed with layers of trailing varieties of flower plants, like deep purple petunias, followed by sunny yellows, or a spread of blue Viola with yellow and orange Sweet Williams on the borders will have a mesmerizing visual effect. Try growing trailers like sweet peas, nasturtium or morning glory on the fences as the background.

There are many ways one can add beauty to the flower beds. While creating a number of flower beds in a garden, one must take care to create a harmonious flow between them. This is essential to give the whole landscape an aesthetic visual appeal.

Ideas for Landscaping a Hill – A Few Suggestions

First and the foremost thing that a hill landscape architect has to consider is the steepness of the hill. He has to develop the idea for landscaping the hill based on incline of the hill. Landscaping ideas for a gentle incline and a steep slope would be entirely different.

Take into consideration the type of soil of the hill and the possibilities of erosion. Erosion could destroy the garden of the hill landscape. If the hill has a steep incline, there is always a possibility of landslides. This point has to be considered before designing a landscape garden for a hill.

If you are landscaping a steep hill, it would be a good idea to plant trees that develop deep root networks. This would prevent erosion and landslides and at the same time help to maintain water level in ground.

This idea for landscaping a hill helps to make the soil stable and also provides shade. Instead of trees, shrubs that have good root network system, which would help in preventing erosion, could also be planted.

It would be good landscaping idea to convert a gentle hill into a beautiful garden that has colorful flowering plants. Another idea for landscaping a hill is to cut the gentle slope to make terrace gardens.

When you are landscaping a hill, make sure to install a retaining wall and a few steps on the hill. A retaining wall would prevent landslides and also ensures the soil is not eroded. This is an idea to maintain water level in the plants. The plants grown on a landscaped hill have to be watered regularly. Carving out steps on a hill helps to deal not only with erosion but also gives a unique beauty to the hill landscape.

Another idea for landscaping a hill is to create a rock garden. A rock garden could be constructed to hold the shape of a hill. A rock garden would help to redirect the water coming down the slopes of the hill landscape to a sump to be recycled later or to the vegetation on level ground below the hill.

Landscaping designs exhibit the creative and imaginative ability and skills of a professional. A professional has to strike a balance between the appearance of the garden and the functionality. It is the responsibility of a landscaping architecture to ensure the prevention of landslides and soil erosion.

Basil, thyme, rosemary, cinnamon! Lovely plants aren’t they? Lush green and look excellent when kept in potted plants. And so useful! Just imagine…you’re cooking and suddenly you run out of curry leaves. Instead of running to the nearest grocery shop, just hop into your own herb garden and pluck out a few leaves and there you go! A lifetime’s supply of taste-giving, medicinal herbs and oxygen too! The pride of your yard indeed. Everyone is looking for the perfect herb garden design plans!

Of course, growing a wide array of such herbs, native of their own climates and soil compositions is not going to be easy. Each herb is used to its own ecosystem and creating herb garden designs in one-size-fits-all is not very easy. So how to layout a herb garden?

Herb Garden Design Plans

The Preliminaries
Firstly, you have to decide which herbs you want in your garden.

Herbs are plenty and will vary with your needs. For example, if you have a particular chronic health problem, it will make sense to grow a herb that will help alleviate the illness. Similarly, it is no good growing parsley if you are not going to use it in any of your dishes! So first decide on the use and utility of each herb that you’re planning to grow. Also consider your local climatic conditions. Herbs are pretty delicate plants so plant them only if you think that the necessary weather conditions are suitable for them.

Herb Garden Designs
You can choose one or a combination of the below given herb garden design plans based on the herbs you are planning to plant. Each of these types has its own advantages and disadvantages. So try to maximize the advantages based on the herbs you use:

Container Planting
Simply put, container plantings are herb garden design plans where you are growing herbs in pots. The easiest way to do this is to club together all the herbs that need similar soils and sun exposure. Conversely, you could also pot each herb into individual small pots. I prefer the latter idea as it avoids the possibility of overcrowding. Most folks make the mistake of planting herbs too close to each other. This will create a competition between the herbs for space and the weaker ones will get a beating. So while making your herb garden design plans, make sure that the plants are well spaced out.