Lets hear about your coop!

[PoultryBird12]

Tonight I piled lots of hay in my coop.... dragged two big bags of feed over to the chickens and ducks, filled the feeder all the way up, sprinkled seeds and corn on the floor along with some grit... turned the light on... and now, my animals are happy! I'm happy! Now they have fresh, sweet hay on the floor of the coop and nice, fresh food. Tomorrow I will give them fresh, clean water in the morning, and even more food also. I will collect their eggs (yes my ducks are laying in this cold weather in MN.) and they will be happy!

I would like to hear how your coop and your poultry are doing! So reply to this thread and have fun!!! Lets see how many people can reply to this!

 

[PoultryBird12]

My coop just a simple 4x8 metal shed that blew away on a relative that I got for free. I reconditioned it and changed it into a chicken coop.
My pop door opener is quite simple and has not failed yet. I use a length of whipper Snipper line attached to a guillotine type door. I pull one end of the line and secure it door opens; I disengage that end of the line door closes. No pulleys or fancy do daddery just a small hole drilled down in the top frame of the door on a slope and the line threaded through. If you give a second glance you can see the line against the gray wall on the right. Magic!



If you give my coop another glance you will notice a trailer hitch on the left side or east end my coop faces north; East will be better I learned this year. You can tell where my coop was the previous year by the location of this garden spot and young buck. Makes gardening Easy Peasy less weeds and ground preperation. My gardens grow like wild fire.
Works for me in my small set up.

" I have close to 65 trips now around the sun; My coop was salvaged; Blew away from a relative. Hundreds of Coops can put mine to shame but I would not trade this coop for any because mine "MAKES ME HAPPY!"every day.

Watering
For along time I used heater tape around a bucket with chicken watering nipples. It worked excellent. However me being me I neglected to change the water as often as I should. This is what it looks like and it thermostatically controlled to come on at just above the freezing temperature. You would have to wrap it to suit your particular application if it is viable for your set up. It is available at Home Depot in Canada.




I switched to black rubber contains. The freeze solid every night but the ice just pops out of them in the morning and I replenish them with fresh warm water. They are available at the feed store.

The chickens congregate around them like people having their morning coffee. The only draw back is my yard is pepper with small ice bergs the size of the buckets.

April looks after that however..



My Coop is insulated with Styrofoam covered with veneer from interior doors from Habitat From Humanity. Here are a few tips and a quick look at my set up.
My floor are planks with a layer of tin for rodent proofing. On top of the tin I have a piece of vinyl flooring cut one foot longer than the length and width of my coop (roughly). Six inches squares are cut out of the 4 corners of the vinyl flooring. This allows the friction fitted flooring to travel up the walls six inches around the perimeter of my 4x8 salvaged metal coop. Shovel out the heavy stuff into a wheel barrow. Pop out the vinyl flooring hose it off pop it back in.
Easy Peasy!

Bedding
I have used all types of litter for coops.

I have not tried sand (sand gets good reviews on this site).

Of all the things I tried to date wood pellets have been the best. (I tried wood pellets as a last resort when pine shavings were not available.) They are super absorbent and swell up and eventually turn to saw dust. The droppings just seem to vanish and turn to dust when it comes in contact with wood pellets .

Replace my litter and clean my coop every October after I harvest my garden.


Works for me in my deep litter method.

I do add to pellets from time to time.

I have anywhere from 10 to 24 birds housed in my 4x8 coop.

Through the winter months the pellets froze harder than concrete with -40º temperatures. The poop froze before it could be absorbed by the pellets and there was like a crusty layer of poop in certain areas where they collectively took aim (no smell, messy feet or flies @ -40º). When the crust got big enough to handle with gloves I picked it up and dropped it into my compost bin. Come April things started to look after themselves.

Nest boxes
In my nest boxes I fold a feed bag to fit (nest boxes are 1 ft³). When a bag gets soiled; fold a new one; pop out the soiled; pop in the new. Feed bags are a nylon mesh bag frozen poop just peels off in below freezing temperatures and just flakes off in summer when left out in the sun to bake and dry.



POOP BOARDS are the "BEST" addition yet. Handles well over ½ of the poop in my set up keeps ammonia smell in check 3½" below roost excellent for catching eggs laid through the night (roost are in cups for easier removal and cleaning). I recently friction fit a piece of vinyl flooring over my poop board.it makes clean up even easier; Pop out; Scrap; Hose; Pop in.

Winter months even easier flex over compost bin DONE!

Easy peasy!.



Awesome!! looks like your chickens love it! Thanks for sharing!

 

[aart]

Quote: The very wet mash is to be darn sure the 7 one-week old chicks are hydrated because it's going to be -7F tonite......it's been so cold that they haven't been spending alot of time out of the nest so I wanted to be sure. It seemed to work well they gobbles it down and all have full crops this evening.

 

[LipsChicks]

I'm from North Dakota so I know your winter! I have a feeder that I made that only needs to be filled every two weeks and my waterer only needs to be filled every 4th day. Even with all that, I go out at least once a day to gather eggs and give them treats. I also check for pecking, etc. I just love going in there to see how content they look. This week in this dreadful weather, they haven't wanted to go out. I have an automatic door that opens at dawn and if they're not out by 11 or so, I close the door. It's hard to believe I get so much joy out of a handful of chickens!

 

[PoultryBird12]

I'm from North Dakota so I know your winter! I have a feeder that I made that only needs to be filled every two weeks and my waterer only needs to be filled every 4th day. Even with all that, I go out at least once a day to gather eggs and give them treats. I also check for pecking, etc. I just love going in there to see how content they look. This week in this dreadful weather, they haven't wanted to go out. I have an automatic door that opens at dawn and if they're not out by 11 or so, I close the door. It's hard to believe I get so much joy out of a handful of chickens!

Sounds like you have pretty good system worked out! I have to bring the waterer in every night then fill it up early in the morning and bring it back out. Their food last maybe a day or two... but ducks eat so much. I also open their door every day and then close it in the night. I don't mind the work... but when it's this cold... it gets really annoying.

 

[fanniefarmer]

I'm from North Dakota so I know your winter! I have a feeder that I made that only needs to be filled every two weeks and my waterer only needs to be filled every 4th day. Even with all that, I go out at least once a day to gather eggs and give them treats. I also check for pecking, etc. I just love going in there to see how content they look. This week in this dreadful weather, they haven't wanted to go out. I have an automatic door that opens at dawn and if they're not out by 11 or so, I close the door. It's hard to believe I get so much joy out of a handful of chickens!

Hi. Your setup sounds great! I'd like to know more about that automatic door. Did you build it or order it? I'm getting older and want to automate as much of the babies' actual care as possible so I can just enjoy more without so much lifting, running out in the weather, etc. Thanks!

 

[LipsChicks]

I'd brag about my chicken door to anyone. I've loved it from the very first day. I installed it MYSELF. !it's worked perfectly since the very first day. It's called The Pullet Shut Automatic Chicken Door. The number is 512-995- 0058.. They always answer the phone and seem happy to answer questions. You can see a demo on YouTube.

 

[fanniefarmer]

Thanks so much! I'm sure gonna check it out. Now for a little about me, I kept chickens years ago but had to give up the farm. Now I'm starting over. I bought six baby Ameraucanas from Little Birdie Hatchery in Wake Forest, NC. One died the first night but the others are doing great. They're all females and two are the blue looking ones - lots of gray with pretty rust colored feathers throughout. The other three are mostly black with beautiful gold feathers evenly placed all over. I wanted an Ameraucana rooster so I got a purebred Black Ameraucana with two hens not long ago. Nobody is laying yet but I'm expecting an egg any day from the Blacks as they are older. Today I located a purebred Lavender Ameraucana Rooster. Will probably get him to have even more variety. Since everyone is purebred I thought I would try to pair them off later with their kinds and raise babies and hatching eggs. My coop is a 14x14 horse stall converted with roosting poles and nest boxes. I'm fixing to water test the semi-automatic waterer I built from SSL Family Dad on YouTube's video. Check him and his family out at simplesuburbanliving.com. You can get all kinds of great advice and videos and they are super nice folks. He also built a semi-automatic feeder that I'm gonna try next. Anyway it's all fun and exciting. It's my new family.

 

[PoultryBird12]

I'd brag about my chicken door to anyone. I've loved it from the very first day. I installed it MYSELF. !it's worked perfectly since the very first day. It's called The Pullet Shut Automatic Chicken Door. The number is 512-995- 0058.. They always answer the phone and seem happy to answer questions. You can see a demo on YouTube.

Looked it up on google

looks nice! How long have you had it?

 

[PoultryBird12]

Thanks so much! I'm sure gonna check it out. Now for a little about me, I kept chickens years ago but had to give up the farm. Now I'm starting over. I bought six baby Ameraucanas from Little Birdie Hatchery in Wake Forest, NC. One died the first night but the others are doing great. They're all females and two are the blue looking ones - lots of gray with pretty rust colored feathers throughout. The other three are mostly black with beautiful gold feathers evenly placed all over. I wanted an Ameraucana rooster so I got a purebred Black Ameraucana with two hens not long ago. Nobody is laying yet but I'm expecting an egg any day from the Blacks as they are older. Today I located a purebred Lavender Ameraucana Rooster. Will probably get him to have even more variety. Since everyone is purebred I thought I would try to pair them off later with their kinds and raise babies and hatching eggs. My coop is a 14x14 horse stall converted with roosting poles and nest boxes. I'm fixing to water test the semi-automatic waterer I built from SSL Family Dad on YouTube's video. Check him and his family out at simplesuburbanliving.com. You can get all kinds of great advice and videos and they are super nice folks. He also built a semi-automatic feeder that I'm gonna try next. Anyway it's all fun and exciting. It's my new family.

Awesome! I bought three ameraucanas but sadly two died. Now I only have one. She is not the friendliest critter...but she's ok.

one of her two sisters died due to poor judgement of me. She was too small to be in the coop and she got wedged between something and died in the night. I didn't know it happened until later the next day. Her other sister died recently. She must have flown out of her run because I saw her outside so I ran around d the coop to try to scare her back in but she was gone. No sign of her anywhere. I'm sad because #1: it's always sad to loose a pet and #2: I know ameraucanas lay pretty eggs.

that's my story.

nota very happy one, though