Advise on my Coop design, Please

If you read my member introduction you know that I have designed my coop already; well before owning chickens. I have tried to incorporate as much as I could from all the reading and learning I have done so far. Since all of you are much more knowledgeable on this than I am; I would appreciate any advise you have on what I have so far. I sure hope you can see this OK, I don't know any other way of showing it. Looking forward to any comments or suggestions you may have. I have 96 sq ft available, that should permit me 24 birds; though I will probably start with half that.

Well I guess the Copy/Paste was not effective. Any advise how to post a pdf of a paint drawing on here? So I can post design.

Hello there and welcome to BYC!

Try taking a picture of the drawing and then uploading it as a pic. Or even a screenshot. Scanning it and then sending it to your pics and then downloading it might work as well.

When you are typing in this box, there is a "Preview" button at the bottom right. You can click on that to see if your pics are being loaded here. If the page is still blank, then keep trying until something appears during a Preview.

Looks like a nice sized coop! About 5 square feet per bird is needed in the coop, 10 square feet per bird in the run. However the more room you give your birds the better off they will be in body mind and spirit. Chickens go off easily on each other. So never push the envelop on 5 square foot per bird. If they are all stuck inside on those cold snowy days for a week or so, they are all going to be killing each other. So give them as much room as possible.

The only thing I see that I would change is your roost bars. For one, they are not big enough. Each bird needs at least if not more that 1 foot of space on the bar. During the summer they like a bit more so they can space themselves out. I am not fond of ladder type roosting bars. Too much fighting at roosting time for the top bars and when one bird is directly above the other, it can lead to butt feather plucking, picking at vents and bare butts. So make sure you have plenty of room on the bars. Roosting time can get pretty aggressive.

Other than that, it looks like a nice sized coop and design.

So you suggest 1 long Roost bar running from front to back on that same wall then. I never realized the possibility of the butt feather picking, guess that makes sense though. I was just concerned that the higher ones would be pooping on the lower ones. That's why I staggered the roost. I will make the same roost change in the brooder as well. Also, how high up should the roost be? I was thinking about 5 feet, would that be OK?

Glad you joined us!

X2 on TwoCrows advice.

As for how high your roost should be, it depends on the breeds of chickens you're planning on having. With heavy breeds (most dual purpose birds like Wyandottes, Orpingtons, etc.), the roosts shouldn't be much more than two feet high. If the roost is higher, you risk leg problems from the birds jumping down hard, or they might not even be able to fly that high.

However, if you have bantams or flightier, light-weight breeds (Leghorns, etc.), a five foot high roost would be just fine. Chickens love to roost high.

I am planning on raising Buckeyes, Black Australorps and some kind of green and blue egg laying machines. So, now I'm guessing the roost needs to be lower because those are larger breeds; if I'm correct. I've been researching the green and blue eggs so I guess some direction would be appreciated on that as well. Thank you so far.