Woods Colony House - Portable

[Howard E]

BTW, for the back part above where the birds will roost, I used plywood decking with comp shingles. White to reflect heat vs. absorb it. Definitely heavier and more difficult to do than a metal roof, but metal has a problem. On the inside build picture, you notice the roof of the horsebarn is uninsulated metal roof. When horses are left in the box stalls overnight in cool weather, it will literally rain inside that building as the moisture condenses on the metal to the point of dripping off it. Birds create even more moisture than horses would, so painted plywood with comp shingles it was for the back part to prevent condensation dripping on roosting birds and to reflect more winter light to brighten the place up. The front scratch shed was covered with translucent white poly panels to let in more light. If those drip water, it won't be over the roosts, so won't matter much.

 

[exalted512]

That looks great! I'm currently in the process of building my own Woods' house, but you're definitely further along than I am. Here is mine as it sat last week:
https://goo.gl/photos/XAw4TTeWLtQvxxjr8

It's got the back on it now and the inside was painted and I put some rubberized coating on the floor and that's about as far as I've got. Hoping to do the second coat on the floor tomorrow and have the chickens in it by Sunday. I still have to finish the door (its in progress), the monitor, hardware cloth, chicken door, trim, roosts, and paint. You can see in that picture that in the back of the house, there's a spot where you can sweep it out as well. So hopefully by the end of this weekend, I'll have the door, hardware cloth, and the 'clean out' finished and that's good enough to get the birds in there. It would be great to have the monitor done, but we'll see if there's time.

We have a metal shop building that is tan with maroon trim, so that is what we are doing with the coop as well. Eventually, I'll add a run too, but it's not high on my priority list right now. We only have 9 birds in a 8x12 coop, although I would like to double that number eventually.

I put mine on skids too, but I'm hoping I never have to move it. I built the floor and sides in my shop, but drug the floor out with the tractor and assembled the sides on site. I enjoy this kind of stuff, but I've been working on it for a while now so I'd like to see it finished...
-Cody

 

[Howard E]

Just realized this has never been updated.

Birds went into this house at 2 weeks of age, and for the next 3 weeks, I had a heat lamp running for them and block off the drafts at ground level with a couple bales of hay. They went through a few nights with frost, so it got pretty cold in there at night. At 5 weeks of age, weather was warming up and they feathered out, so heat lamps were pulled and all survived.

Also at about 5 or 6 weeks, I put up a ring of 2" x 4" wire around the front to give them a small controlled area of grass on the outside. A small playpen of sorts. This trained them where the pop door was and allowed them some fun in the sun or they could also go back inside if they wanted. This was also part of helping them remember where home was. That was left in place for 2 to 3 weeks, then pulled to give them open access to the fenced in yard. Even today, they never venture far from "home".

Even though I had roost bars up, they didn't start using them until about 8 or 9 weeks of age. Up until then, they stayed in a pile on the floor. Roost bars started out about 30" off the floor, but after most of them kept trying for the plate on top of the back wall......hurling themselves at it in a vain attempt to roost higher, I moved the roost bars to about 42 inches or so off the deck. From there, they can see the plate and no longer try to go any higher. Since then, all they do is fight for position on the roosts until it gets dark enough they decide to calm down and accept what they got and try to do better next time.

Two roost bars, which are level. One is 1" x 1.5" on edge....narrow side up........and the one most prefer to use. The second is 1.5" x 1.5". They land on that one, then hop from it to the back one. They usually form two groups packing into the corners.

Food and water are kept inside. If I will be gone for the day, they are left inside all day. If I'm around, they are let out to roam around inside a fenced in back yard. Chain link only. They go to the fence, and roam up and down it, but stay inside. None have ever flown out. Yard area is about 60' x 150'.

Front part with open screen does allow wind driven rain to enter and litter in that area is frequently dry on top, but damp below. Back part remains mostly dry. Litter is 2 to 3 inches deep and building. No flies.....no stink and they spend a lot of time in there.

I'm still 4 to 6 weeks from the first eggs, so still no laying boxes for now. Will start working on them when the weather cools down a bit. Mid 90's today with high humidity. Weather for forecast for tomorrow actually said 85 degrees and 85% humidity. Construction projects in those conditions does not excite me much.

Predators? No losses to date, but not because they have not tried:

 

[RezChamp]

I can tell lots of thought/planning went into this setup.
Kudos

 

[Howard E]

Nest boxes went in a while back. I put them on the back wall. Three boxes should be adequate for about 12 to 15 birds. Next boxes are not permanently mounted, rather just sit on wall brackets, so can be removed for cleaning. Bottoms are 1/2" x 1" 14 gauge welded wire, which lets dirt and fine stuff drop through to the ground. Boxes are 14" x 14". Board across the front could be an inch or two taller to retain more of the hay used for the nest bedding. Once they started laying, birds seem to be using all three nest boxes equally.

Roof over nest boxes is sloped about 30 degrees to keep birds from sitting on it. Roost bars elevated above the nest boxes.

 

[aart]

Nest boxes went in a while back. I put them on the back wall. Three boxes should be adequate for about 12 to 15 birds. Next boxes are not permanently mounted, rather just sit on wall brackets, so can be removed for cleaning. Bottoms are 1/2" x 1" 14 gauge welded wire, which lets dirt and fine stuff drop through to the ground. Boxes are 14" x 14". Board across the front could be an inch or two taller to retain more of the hay used for the nest bedding. Once they started laying, birds seem to be using all three nest boxes equally.

Roof over nest boxes is sloped about 30 degrees to keep birds from sitting on it. Roost bars elevated above the nest boxes.

Nice nest bank!
That's the 'back' wall???

 

[enggass]

Hey Howard, I don't quite follow what you're saying about how the windows work... also, for the 12 foot dimension, how did you divide it for front and rear. I was thinking of 4' & 8'... I can't build until next March, but when the time comes I may have a few questions to bounce off you. Nice job!!

 

[Howard E]

Nice nest bank!
That's the 'back' wall???

Ooops. That should have been wall opposite the door. In all his various versions except one, Woods put the nest boxes about where I have them.....on one or both side walls just forward or the roosts. On the 6' x 10' version, he put them under the roost bars with a droppings board between them......about the only place he used a droppings board.

For most of his houses, he also put the west window opposite the door. The west window was located in the larger back part of the building vs. the forward scratching shed where I put mine. Benefit would be greater air circulation in summer and more light to the back part in the latter part of the day in winter. When you look at his designs and notice a compass drawn to detail the orientation of the building to the sun you begin to get a feel for how far they went to research the absolute optimum conditions for production from their birds. Their chickens were pampered livestock, but they were not pets. They were were a valuable and dependable source of food and income. They did the best for them to get the best out of them.

 

[Howard E]

Hey Howard, I don't quite follow what you're saying about how the windows work... also, for the 12 foot dimension, how did you divide it for front and rear. I was thinking of 4' & 8'... I can't build until next March, but when the time comes I may have a few questions to bounce off you. Nice job!!

The way I did the windows was to have them sliding open and closed by sliding horizontally on a 2 x 4, framed under the window opening, narrow side up. To keep it in place, I notched a vertical 2 x 4 forward of the window. Regardless of how they are framed, horizontally sliding windows was a pretty common way of opening and closing them back when. We had a portable hog house that had three of them. It is at least 50 years old and is still standing. I noticed my dad went to the trouble of tilting the window sills out so they would drain better. But he didn't put screens on his to keep the varmints out.

There are two parts to framing these buildings. The back part under and behind the monitor windows and front part, which I refer to as the forward scratching shed. When you scale it up and down, you start with the desired total depth of the long side.......say 12'. The width needs to be kept in that proportion of 1.6 so divide 12 / 1.6 = 7.5 feet. (7' 6"). The back part is then 7.5' square, the front part is then 12' minus 7.5' or 4.5'. So the front part would be 7.5' x 4.5'. Basically it is two different sheds, joined and butted together to form a single building. The front part with it's roof, and back part with it's roof.

To get the most out of my materials, which included 4' x 8' plywood roof decking and 4' x 8' T1-11 siding panels, and to avoid leaving a lot of waste and scrap laying on the ground, my overall dimensions were 93" square (7' 9") on the back part and 4' x 7'9" on the front part. My width to overall depth ratio is 1.55, so a bit wider that it should be in relation to the depth. So far, the birds have survived it.

I notice Jack E built his 8' wide x 16' deep, so his is not 1.6 but closer to 2.0 depth to width. His probably works better than mine as far as dead air in the back at the roosts, but as near as I can tell, he kept the ratio of about 1.6 front to back. Instead of being square, his back part is a rectangle. His works well and looks good to boot.

 

[Howard E]

One more thing on that proportional ratio thing. Earlier I mentioned the Golden Ratio. The front and back parts seem to conform to it pretty well, so if you stick with that idea as you scale it up and down, it may work for you. Golden ratio is demonstrated by this graphic:



Basic idea is this is a rectangle with two components. Section 8 and all the rest. Section 8 is a square, so when you take that out, you are left with all the rest. All the rest is also a rectangle, with square section 5, plus all the rest. Take out square 5 and all the rest is then a rectangle, with square section 3, plus all the rest. And so it goes. 1 is to 2, as 1 and 2 are to 3, as 1, 2 and 3 are to 5 as all of those are to 8.

So the back part of the Woods house is 8, and the front scratch shed is all the rest. Build it in that proportion (or close to it) and it should work. The height above the monitor is the same as the sides of the back square.