We lived in Missouri for one year, and two months before my husband found out he was getting a promotion and we had to move to Texas, we finished the grandest of coops. I loved my coop, it matched our house, and was just the bomb. The offer came in, and included was a clause that we had to leave the coop. Sigh. We left it. Our new farm came with a very very old, and very basic coop, without nest boxes, even. It did have a nice series of dog runs for our run, and had total tree cover for shade. My poor girls, though. They went from a castle to the shack. We loaded up our 7 goats, the 16 girls, and two pigs in a horse trailer that my husband built a coop in the top of for the move. It got us by for the winter, but I knew spring would bring a new coop. Being on a farm, and not in estates this time, I wanted a reclaimed coop. I wanted to make it "farm-like". We went to a reclaimed fence place, and bought old stockade fence panels. I stained them a lovely redwood, which matches the door of our house. We wanted to work with the skeleton of the current coop, and add on. I also have fallen in love with the dirt floor in the shack. So, the coop went from 5x6 feet, which just fit my "old" flock barely, to 5x21 feet!! My spring babies, and the 7 I recently purchased fit with the existing flock, with a ton of room to spare. We have so much perch space that sits empty, two feeders inside, and will have 10 nesting boxes when we are done. We went with the existing old tin roof, and reclaimed some additional tin to cover the add on. The roof is slightly slanted because of the add on, but I adore my new coop. We were able to get one piece of fencing with the gate, so we even have used that as my door. We still need to add some trim, but we have multiple windows, roof vents, and the fencing itself lends to ventilation. The north end will have a solid board added in winter, but we are in Texas, and heat is far more dangerous then cold here. Last week, it was 103 out, and our coop was cooler then it was outside.
