From Shanty to Super Coop

[sberry002]

Tulsa, OK city ordinances only allow us 5 birds, and I too am converting a play house to a coop. Would love to see inside pics of your original coop

 

[teria]

We don't really have chewing predators, and our yard is secure. Our biggest security concern is our own dogs, but we manage them. We're cutting venting in several places in the peaks of the end walls. We saw a few big coops with venting up at the peaks, so, we're hoping that will be sufficient, but, will add venting on the roof if need be.

We also have gaps at the top of the walls just under the roof line where we will only close with hardware wire, so, ventilation will hopefully be taken care of that way. Still, we're going to monitor it closely until we know for sure.

 

[teria]

Tulsa, OK city ordinances only allow us 5 birds, and I too am converting a play house to a coop. Would love to see inside pics of your original coop

I'll try to get some for ya this week. It's kind of a hodge podge. We built and added as we went, mostly because we added chickens to our original flock of 6, so we needed more roosting space. We're planning to renovate it when we move the chickens into the super coop, because we have a hen turkey that will move from our plastic little tykes playhouse into the wooden playhouse. It's taller, and she will like having a higher roost.

 

[teria]

The super coop is almost done, at least the outside of it. The walls are all up, the siding is on, the roof is on and papered. Now, we just have to get the shingles on, if the weather will cooperate for more than one day in a row. It snowed almost every other day since we put the paper on, so, we are hoping for a full two days of bright sunshine to dry the paper. Then we can lay the shingles and not care what the weather does after that.



The two peak ends still need to have siding and vents put in. Plus, the north end, the peak facing the picture, will have a window that we picked up at the Habitat for Humanity store. It's going to be the full width of the lower part of the peak, and is arched. It will take up the bottom fourth of the peak, and I am really hoping it looks as nice as I imagine it. You just never know when you just envision something, if it will really work or not.

The girls are getting anxious to move into their new digs, and we are considering letting Kris, our turkey hen, shack up with them. I know you really shouldn't house turkeys and chickens together due to the risk of the chickens passing black spot to the turkey, but, they practically have lived together all their lives. They just sleep in different houses, but, all day long they hang out together. She really isn't happy living alone in her little house now that the Tom is gone. Plus, they can keep each other warm. Right now she has no one to help her stay warm through these long cold winter nights, and I really worry about her. I refuse to supplement heat for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is the fire hazard, but, oh how I worry about that girl.

So, since the super coop is really large, and even with us using half of it as a storage shed, there will be plenty of room for all of the chickens to have roosting space, and for the nesting boxes, and for some space to walk around inside on stormy days, and for Kris to have her own roost and nest area. Turkeys prefer to be high, so, I'll put a couple of higher roosts to give her some options. She and two of my hens are buddies, so, I expect they will probably cozy up together. Guess we'll see.

This week, we start putting in the roosts. Then, it's moving day.

 

[aart]

Dodging the weather...my daughter just went thru the same thing with her roof and now about same thing with house wrap and siding.

It's looking good!

 

[BBQJOE]

This coop looks fantastic! Will you be charging the chickens rent? If so, How much? I need to make a few bucks off my chickens.
Do you provide furniture and digital entertainment as well, because I think that should be included in the rent.

 

[teria]

This coop looks fantastic! Will you be charging the chickens rent? If so, How much? I need to make a few bucks off my chickens.
Do you provide furniture and digital entertainment as well, because I think that should be included in the rent.

I would totally charge them rent, but, as long as they keep laying eggs, I guess I'll let them stay for free.

As far as furniture, funny you should say that. I actually plan to have at least a chair for me, and a table to work on, plus, I will certainly have music for my girls. The price they will pay will be having to listen to my preferred music choice, which can be anything from latin music (when I'm in the mood to head down to a mexican beach for vacation) to Christmas music, and that can be anytime of the year. I think that's torment enough to allow free rent.

 

[BBQJOE]

I would totally charge them rent, but, as long as they keep laying eggs, I guess I'll let them stay for free.

As far as furniture, funny you should say that. I actually plan to have at least a chair for me, and a table to work on, plus, I will certainly have music for my girls. The price they will pay will be having to listen to my preferred music choice, which can be anything from latin music (when I'm in the mood to head down to a mexican beach for vacation) to Christmas music, and that can be anytime of the year. I think that's torment enough to allow free rent.

I'm seriously thinking about running some speaker wire and some outdoor speakers for my chickens.
Good lord, we're a strange bunch, huh?

 

[teria]

Tulsa, OK city ordinances only allow us 5 birds, and I too am converting a play house to a coop. Would love to see inside pics of your original coop

Here is the nitty gritty pictures of the inside of our shanty coop made from a wood victorian playhouse. You can see the shredded office paper I use to give them soft, dry places to spend their nights in the below freezing temps we've had. I hadn't really intended to do that, but, the littles ended up being bullied off the high roosting bars, and decided to squeeze into the shelves we used originally for the nesting boxes. So, we moved the nests onto the coop floor, and I toss the paper onto the shelves to give them a soft clean shelf to sit on all night. The roosts are removable, using bamboo rods duct taped to the underside of 2x4's. The rods fit into curtain holders at either end, so they can be lifted out for cleaning them and the coop. That would have worked great had we not ended up needing to add roosts on both ends, which were screwed permanently into the removable roosts, making them pretty much impossible to lift out to clean. So, cleaning was a real pain, and I mean as in painful. I ended up with more bumps and bruises and a headache after cleaning. That's what drove us to build the super coop.




The lower roost areas are only really used by the littles on occasion. Chickens prefer high roosts, so, those are only used as a way to get up to the higher roosts.



You can see the coop door, and the top of one of our nesting boxes (which are just 5 gallon buckets with the nest box lid I got on the internet) .

 

[teria]

The inside of the rafters of our Super Coop.



Since taking this picture Tim has put the shingles on the roof, attached the accent window to the North peak, and is prepping to finish enclosing both peaks with siding. Then it's time to cut and install vents on both peaks, and start working on the inside.