I only needed to get one more post sunk in order to get the last section of fence panel installed for the east side of the aviary wall. Once that is done I can start the construction of the front of the aviary, which will involve actually making a half and half wall, with the bottom half being more or less a fence and the top half a chicken wire fence. The reason for this is so any small birds that are released to the general population won't be able to slip through any gaps or cracks with the chicken wire. Plus the image that I have in my head has it where the whole front will look more aesthetically pleasing than just a whole chicken wire wall. An outside shot of the east wall of the aviary, showing the extra panels and pickets and wood from the leftover fence staged off to the right. The panel that was hung was about a foot or two shorter than the span that was needed so I cut a short piece of another panel and tied it to the larger panel with 2x4's. To start off the construction of the front, I sunk two more posts at a midway spot between the two cab coops in order to hang a chain link gate panel. From these posts I hung three 2x4's, one at about a foot off the ground and the other around 2.5ft off the ground. The third one was hung at the very top of the posts. I sunk one more posts at about a midway point between the west fence and the gate. I hung more 2x4's to complete the framing of the front as visualized. The next move that I had to do was hang fence pickets along the bottom half of the wall where the 2x4s are spaced close together. To make things easier, I just screwed down a picket then cut the thing level with the middle 2x4, then took that section of picket and hung it next to the previous picket, repeating the process. There was plenty of waste pieces left from all the pickets after getting the bottom half of the wall covered but it was an acceptable outcome as I go the wall totally covered. With the pickets done next was the chicken wire. I had some rolls of 4ft wire that would work just fine for this application. The wire overhung at the top by maybe 6 inches which was no big deal as I could just snip that off along the top. I used U-tacks to secure the wire along the 2x4s at the top and bottom, taking time to stretch the chicken wire some as I secured it in place. With the chicken wire hung the aviary was pretty much ready to admit the birds into. We still have to build a covering to fully contain the birds so it can be considered a true aviary and not just a pen by definition. The birds' wings needed to be clipped to keep the few smart ones from making their way to the top of the front wall and going over. More than likely I will go back to the original bird netting idea in unison with the framing so if necessary I can remove the material to get to any branches that may fall on top, which will be more difficult if there's chicken wire permanently attached to the top. For right now the birds are officially contained.
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