Slap Together Coop from discarded free stuff

[Compost King]

OK not everything on this was "free" I paid for the roofing ($21), the concrete blocks, and the screws. I also paid for 2' tall chicken wire for the run(the run is 8 feet tall in total the chicken wire just holds the bamboo in place). Its not even finished but I took pictures of my progress until now... half way point. I can say the bamboo is free but considering how many hours I spent harvesting it and processing it, its pretty expensive. Luckily I have the time to waste on doing something I love.
I try to make coops as cheap as possible, if I pay too much for the coop then I could have just put that money towards buying someone elses free range eggs on craigslist.
I only posted this because everyone I know is annoyed about me talking about chickens so I come here when that happens. I have other coops I slapped together from free stuff, most look horrendous but the chickens stay dry at night, predators stay out, they have a place to lay eggs and eat feed. Thats really all they need. I might post some pictures showing the weave job I do with the Chicken wire and bamboo. Neighbors let me take it so they don't have to clear it. Besides I make sure to give neighbors eggs if they let me take bamboo. I have about 7 weeks to finish this project so everyday I put about an hour into it.

 

[N F C]

Making good progress! I like the bamboo idea and would be interested in seeing how you weave it with chicken wire.

 

[love4mychickens]

Looking Good!

 

[Soon2BChixMom]

I just posted my basically free coop "pallet hybrid coop" is what it is titled in this forum. I spent money on an automatic door which I justified since it cost me the same as the prefab I bought in Oct. Other than that I spent money on a gallon of paint, some vinyl stuff that I bought for something else that didn't work out, a box of screws, and a latch. So spent about $240 total.
My husband did most of the work. His dad helped side it. I helped in the construction. It is definitely not engineered by a carpenter. Lol. But, it is so much more sturdy than the prefab! I love it. Move in day for them is tomorrow.

 

[Soon2BChixMom]

Here is the link if you are interested .
https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/my-pallet-hybrid-coop.1234170/

 

[Compost King]

Soon2b, I loved the pallet coop, your craftsmanship is leagues ahead of mine. I like slapping together something together like a kid builds a clubhouse.

NFC I will post a link that shows How I weave Bamboo into Chicken wire... although its just fencing in the picures it also works for being rock solid predator proof coop walling with great ventilation however wind driven rain penetrates it. I have lazy remedies for that, cardboard is a great free and temporary protective barrier that falls off later and does a great job of composting in the run with very little effort on my part. Chicken will even scratch it up as worms tend to live under cardboard. It isn't pretty but it all goes to my compost pile anyways.

Here is the first extended wall I built. It's not going to be finished until the entire run is finished, thats when I set the top with my left over Nylon baling yarn. 2 feet of Chicken wire (2 inch holes) 8 feet of pole. The top gets very heavy and I found out the hard way that I need extra reinforcement up high. It fell on me as I was working on the coop and fresh Bamboo gets heavy when there is a lot of it.

This is close up of the weaving, depending on how well you process the bamboo it can be very fast or very slow, I did a sloppy processing job and the the branch stubs cost me a lot of time, however the upside is that it holds together nicer .

Sometimes it tightens up a lot at the end and you can not get Bamboo to weave in, I fixed this by moving the end piece closer, I always over shoot. so I can move the end in closer without creating a gap.

I used the 2 feet chicken wire first to seal off under my deck, But chickens kept sticking their heads out the 2 inch holes and when they pulled their heads back in they were slicing off their combs. So I did my first weave. I used old Bamboo from previous projects because it for this you do not need fresh or strong bamboo, just enough to keep the chickens from slicing their combs off.

After putting it in vertically and seeing how time consuming it was to cut a bunch of short stout pieces and weaving them in, I went with Horizontal narrow discarded poles, both old and new, what ever I had laying around getting in the way. I never finished it because the chickens stopped sticking their heads through it. But I could fill in the gaps easily if that was my intention.

this is the bottom of sloppy slap together free coop, its one of the few completely free to build coops I have since I had used roofing materials sitting around. I ran out of discarded lumber and reused some old chicken wire at the bottom. Predators can squeeze through bamboo since it has some give, and they can chew through Chicken Wire, I found combining the 2 made it predator proof, and yes a Raccoon did try to get into this and failed. you really can't see the weave real well in the picture but its just like the close up picture except it horizontal. I have to check this weekly as Bamboo rots and this is a secure weave... meaning it has to be raccoon proof... thats about the only predator common in this city. it might not be weasel proof but it could be with this method if I put more time into it,

 

[Compost King]

I advanced on the project a little, had to spend money on the doors and door frame due to lack of free materials that would make the door secure. About $15, the hardware cloth I already had in my junk collection though. on the right side there is a large gap between Ceiling and roof, thats for my cats. My cats take over my coops as I build them and get angry when chickens take them over so I started building observation decks for the cats who love to sit and watch chickens all day. They also sleep in them and this one unlike previous observation deck is large enough for a brooder lamp so my cats can sleep in them at night in the winter. You can barely see my calico cat arching her back in that deck, I had no idea she was there when I took the picture, I would have rather she not block the view of the bamboo wall I have on that side.