FEATURE
the house to make best use of the rising sun. We were keen to have the aviary as a garden feature as well as a home for the birds. Being a practical man, the length of flight was largely going to be decided by how it was to be constructed. I therefore had to come up with a design theory based on construction media and available materials – can you tell yet that I’m an Engineer? I was also keen to have flexibility in flight configuration and also provision for easy maintenance and possible extension. I came to the conclusion that a skeleton framework of 50 x 50 x 3 mm square box section, into which would fit identical panels constructed from 25 mm angle was a good all rounder, this also meant that the entire flight side of the aviary could be unbolted and moved to a new location should we ever move house again. But what width and length would these panels be? So now I had to look at what mesh was available in 18 mm (3/4 inch) sq spacing. Rolls of mesh, 16 swg mainly came in 1 m widths, so that was that, the panels would be 1 m wide, with the mesh fixed to the internal side of the angle. The flight length must therefore be either 2 or 3 panels long as to maintain the best view of the birds and a few minor construction issues, the panels would be fitted vertically. Two panels
worked out at just over 2 m, and 3 panels just over 3, which not only took more of the garden than I had originally planned (which the wife forbade), but more importantly, whilst working on a mere 5 ft wide service corridor, would bring the front edge of the aviary too close to the allowable limit of the 5 m restriction. The decision was made. They had to be 2 panels long. Now for the height! I had reckoned on building the base of the aviary out of a solid concrete slab and working upwards from there with concrete blocks, the metal work was to sit on 2 coarses of blocks, this was a multipurpose decision in helping prevent rodent problems and also meant we could have raised flower beds planted all around the flights, enhancing the environment for the parrots and adding to the garden feature aspect. Flying or climbing up and down, is good exercise for the birds, so a 6ft panel on top of the 2 coarses would give just over 7ft, a fair height which would also give me plenty of head room when cleaning the flights. The service corridor would be 5ft, which would give me plenty of room to move about and house the inside cages which would be 18 inch deep by 1 m square (I apologise for mixing units, I’m of the generation where we were
18 BIRD SCENE
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