Bigger isn’t always better. I say that because we had a big barn at the last house and we fretted over losing it when we moved here. Even though the barn was big, it seemed to always be a disorganized mess. I was concerned about where we would store the animal feed here at the farmhouse. I decided to have a small, 8’x10 shed built in a turn-out on the driveway near the road. It seems that smaller is better in this case. In the nearly five months we have been here, it has stayed neat, clean, and organized. It is also quite convenient.
It is just a short walk down the driveway from the house and a quick stop on the way in with the car loaded with bags of feed.
My contractor Allen built the shed, and I absolutely love it. My favorite touch is the door handle made from a horseshoe!
It looks perfect with the property!
Let me take you on a tour of the entire 80 square feet. This is it!
To the left of the door is storage for bales. We have three in there now but could stack many more. We keep one bale in a Rubbermaid tote just outside the donkey shelter, so we don’t have to carry hay from the shed on a daily basis.
Continuing along the left wall is an area for storing bags of feed. I just added these today.
There is a nice, albeit dirty, window on the back of the shed. We deliberated about spending the money to have it put in, but I am so glad that we did. There is no electricity in the shed and it would be quite dark without the window. There’s a nice view too.
Under the window on the back wall, I keep containers of feed. There are containers for chicken feed, crimped oats, goat chow, and emu feed. Allen did a wonderful job of building the shed to be varmint proof. I keep the lids on anyway!
On the right side are two containers for storing chicken scratch. It seems like we go through more of that than anything else!
I installed shelving on the right side to store small items and a couple of bags of shavings.
I keep a big scoop in the shed and portion out the feed into collapsible buckets. We use three buckets in the morning and again in the late afternoon. I take the morning shift and Michael takes the afternoon’s. I try to refill the buckets as we go so that they are always ready. On particularly cold or rainy days I get lazy and leave the bags outside on the back porch. I almost always regret that when I have to fill them before heading out. I use different amounts of feed in the afternoon than in the mornings. Michael’s bags are closest to the door.
I don’t mind walking in because I always like the view from inside!
What the animals like best about the feed shack is this pile of stuff on the floor. I call it “forage” and I alternate who gets it every week. It consists of everything I have spilled on the floor during the week. I sweep it into a pile and carry it out to the lucky recipients. Goats get to eat chicken scratch, donkeys get to eat emu food, chickens get to eat goat chow, etc. It is always fun to watch them go nuts over the “forage.” This is a new pile, but under the pasture grass is some really good stuff!
That concludes the tour of our feed shack. See, I told you so. Bigger isn’t always better.
Mary says
Thanks Kathy!
Kathy says
Very nice! I like it alot! Beautiful pictures, too.