Our Coop

Very nice!

Thanks for all the feedback to my first article post. The long walls and floor are 4x8, the short walls are 4x4 and the roof section 2ft tall on side facing the run. We used decking concrete bases leveled with sand and pea gravel to support the 6x6 corner posts. We chose to go with these bases to avoid having to dig holes and pour concrete. The walls and floors are all 2x3 studding at 16" on center. We tried to design the walls and floor in such a fashion we could use as many whole 4x8 sheets of wafer board as possible.

For the run, we used treated lumber for the run along with hardware cloth and chicken wire. Across the top we did place anti-predator netting. The run ended up being 8x8 in size with 2x4's at 24" on center. We chose to add a solar powered electric poultry fence (100' length) to create a temporary run off the 8x8 permanent run. This way we can easily move the electric fence around and still give the birds access from the main run by way of the small door at the front of the run.

Rough material list:

• (7) sheets of OSB
• (3) 6x6x8
• (40+) 2x3x8 (untreated)
• (4) 4x4x8 (treated)
• (20+) 2x4x8 (treated)
• hardware cloth
• chicken wire
• construction screws
• concrete deck supports
• sand
• pea gravel
• various latches/hinges
• 12" common spikes (drive into ground to secure base of main run)