Cheryl's Hen House...

[TerryH]

Hello everyone!! My wife of 31 years, Cheryl is an awesome cook and really wants some chickens to provide her with those beautiful big brown eggs so we've decided to go into the chicken biz.

She's also very excited about tending and generally enjoying the chickens. I'm enjoying the planning and looking forward to the building of the coop and run. I'll be making all the nesting boxes, roosts, feeders and so on. I love to research pretty much anything so I've been scouring this site, YouTube and pretty much everywhere else I can find.

We've chosen a spot for the 8x9 coop and the attached 8x20 run. My woodworking/metalworking/race car shop (30x40) is 100' behind the house with our raised bed veggie garden right next to it. I have a 9x9 compressor room on the back of the shop that houses my air compressor and provides general storage. We are going to attach the coop to the compressor room so they will have a shared wall. Basically we will extend the same shape of the compressor room to form the coop. Here's some views of the garden and shop area.










Here you can see the compressor room better. We will attach to the end wall and go out for the coop. The run will extend past there along where the chain link fence is now. I'll be removing most of the fence. The coop and run will have doors opening into the garden so this will be the back of the coop and run. We're planning on a couple of windows in the back with one window and the entry door on the front.





The coop will be styled much like my storage building but with a sloped roof to match the compressor house of course. I'll be using the same siding, windows and rough cedar trim and the colors will be the same with perhaps a few more whimsical accents just for fun.




And here is the coop and run!! Ok, it's more like a coop and run kit at this point.

I'll begin prepping the site in the next few days. I'm going to start cutting and pre-building as I have time and Cheryl and I will be taking a few days off work in the next few weeks to assemble the coop and run. We are looking very forward to the process and especially to getting the chickens. I know I'll have a bazillion questions along the way. Thanks in advance for being gentle with us newbies. We always had chickens when I was growing up but Cheryl is a city girl so this will be her first time. I'll post more as we go along.

Terry

 

[TerryH]

The girls enjoyed the day in the chicken yard yesterday. Best one day egg count also of 9!

 

[TerryH]

I forgot you are already a builder of things.....what kind of woodworking do you do?...metal working too?...and cars?
Sounds like you've got the gamut of materials experience.

My wife says that my hobby is hobbies.

I do woodworking, furniture building mostly. I have a fully outfitted wood working shop. I've built pretty much every piece of furniture that made sense for me to build in our house. I made all the interior doors, many cabinets and I milled all the trim. I do metal working as well and have a start on metal working equipment, welder, dry cut saw, etc...

Few shop pics.

I built the benches and storage, pretty much everything. I also built the cyclone dust collector and did all the ductwork for the collection system. As we discussed, it's taken years to get it just right. I've moved and rearranged and modified several times to get it to where it is now.

I built my bench in 2002. It's solid white oak and weighs 800 lbs. empty.

This is my metal working area. It also houses the tool boxes etc...

You probably noticed that we also drag race in an unusual way. lol... We have an electric powered dragster. Basically a dragster chassis with some golf cart bodywork, golf cart motor and golf cart rear end and motor, highly modified of course. We actually hold both ends of the NEDRA (National Electric Drag Racing Association) "B" voltage class (211 to 264 volts) 1/8th mile world records. The dragster run's 6.50's @ 100 mph. We also have a tricked out regular cart.

My wife is my pit crew. She's my partner in everything I do. I love that woman!!

Old school tow rig.

We also garden. And now chickens. lol...

 

[TerryH]

Just wanted to report back on the girls. Everyone is doing great. Integration with the 2 older ones has gone perfectly. Getting 9 - 10 beautiful brown, green eggs daily. They gang up on us every time we are even near the coop. They are so funny. The Cinnamon Queens are so noisy! They are the chattiest ones we have ever had.

 

[TerryH]

Another amazing integration example. All 12 hanging right together out in the chicken yard.

 

[TerryH]

I also wanted to say that when we were growing up we always had chickens along with a few head of cattle, horses and Old Jack the Mexican burro. My mom always loved her chickens. Back then there was little to no thought given to the coop or run. It was just some fencing with a pitiful little building that gave them minimal shelter. She will soon be 89 and has lived in our neighborhood for the past 7 years. I think she is more excited about us getting chickens that we are. She came down on her golf cart today and spend several hours just hanging out with us and talking about having chickens. Needless to say she thinks we are a little nuts for going to the lengths we are going just for chickens.

She's very anxious...a little too anxious in fact.. for us to actually get the chickens.

Anyway, I just wanted to share the story. It was great to see her so excited.

 

[TerryH]

My second day off went pretty well today...once I got over being too sore to breathe.

Up and down the ladder a zillion times yesterday was tough on my old body but I thoroughly enjoyed working on the coop. The forecast was for an all day rain but it was just cloudy this morning so I decided to work outside as long as I could. It never rained until 2:30 so I got quite a bit done.

I finished the soffit and most of the trim. Ran out of primed cedar so I didn't get the back wall done but everything else on the outside is pretty well complete. Once the rain came I moved into the shop and built the human door and right as I was getting it done the rain slacked up enough for me to get it installed. I also made a little deck to make the step up into the coop easier. Here are the pics from today.

And the money shot. This is basically the view from our master bedroom.

I'll be back at it after work tomorrow. I'll be taking off Friday evening as I have a speaking engagement but back at it on Saturday. We're getting super excited to get the coop done and get some chicks!!! Then onto the run.

Thanks for looking.

Terry

 

[TerryH]

Ok already.

They are in and all is well. I got the feeders finished up and filled first thing this morning. Moved all the supplies to the storage cabinet. Cut another refrigerator box with a couple of entrances to serve as the fraidy hole. Filled the waterer and we were off. Seems like they love the extra room. They figured out the waterer pretty quickly. The 2 groups are still functioning mostly as 2 groups but are interacting. About as smooth an integration as we could have asked for. Once the kids were in their new home I turned my attention to painting the trim on the outside. Here are the pics and video from today.

Storage cabinet in use.

Fraidy hole is a very popular spot today.

Old faithful the MHP made the transition. They are fascinated with their reflection in the ATP pop door.

Apparently the edge of the fraidy hole is a good roosting spot.

Didn't take too long for them to figure out the HN waterer.

Cut a little step for the feeders. They dug the shavings out until they could barely reach the feeder. Goofy chickens.

Wyandottes especially like the fraidy hole.

And this is what ALL of this has been about. Cheryl is having so much fun with the chickens.

Little video.

Almost forgot. Hope everyone is happy now. Somebody already pooped on my wall.

 

[TerryH]

Posts set today for the run and chicken yard. I think this is gonna be good!!

 

[scooter147]

tall fences make great neighbors, that's my motto.