We began our project right around the time the Coronavirus was hitting the state of Utah which is also the time we acquired our chicks. We needed a project to keep us busy and had planned on buying chicks in August but then kind of panic bought them at the end of March. Don't judge. I wasn't the one buying up all the toilet paper, at least.
We decided to do a 3'x3' (for nine square feet on the inside) coop. Legally we should only have 3 hens on our property and need a minimum of 2 sqft per bird so this gives us a little extra room. (Sorry no pictures of husband building the actual coop itself. He did it very quickly in about one day and I was busy elsewhere prepping our garden. I should say he is a residential framer with lots of practicing building things like this so it may take longer for a person with less experience).
As you can see above, it's a basic box. We decided to put one nesting box inside the coop because as much as I like the look of the nesting boxes with the lid hanging off the side of the coop, I felt like that might be too cold to be inviting in the wintertime. We haven't added the nesting box yet and won't need it for some time yet as our chicks are still young.
You can also see the beginnings of the run in the above picture. We have already dug holes where the pavers are placed for the run and coop to sit on so we don't have to worry about the wood rotting quickly.
Above is our attached run and my husband adding the roof that slants toward him for snow and rain to run off. We plan on adding a gutter and drainpipe someday so we can collect the water and use it in our garden that is to the left of the coop in this picture.
Here we have added the plywood roof and dried it in using something...I'll ask my husband what exactly. We are doing a shingle roof because it's easier for us to get the material for that and my husband is more familiar with that type of roofing over sheet metal or plastic. We covered the run which will provide a lot of shade in the hot summer sun and keep the run dry during the wet and cold months.
Adding mesh to the run. We went with 1/4" hardware cloth and have been happy so far. We also used some on the bottom of our raised beds because we've been dealing with pocket gophers and so we bought this 50' roll on Amazon and definitely recommend it.
Added a door to our run. There's only one latch on the bottom in this picture because we have to add a header above the door for the other latch. The other fenced off area is the garden and the chickens will not be given access to that unless we put them in there.
We are planning on putting peel and stick tile on the floor and adding hardware cloth to the windows so they can be open. Also planning on putting a window box with herbs or something for them to munch on below the window which gets full sun all day. So excited to get the chicks out there!
We decided to do a 3'x3' (for nine square feet on the inside) coop. Legally we should only have 3 hens on our property and need a minimum of 2 sqft per bird so this gives us a little extra room. (Sorry no pictures of husband building the actual coop itself. He did it very quickly in about one day and I was busy elsewhere prepping our garden. I should say he is a residential framer with lots of practicing building things like this so it may take longer for a person with less experience).
As you can see above, it's a basic box. We decided to put one nesting box inside the coop because as much as I like the look of the nesting boxes with the lid hanging off the side of the coop, I felt like that might be too cold to be inviting in the wintertime. We haven't added the nesting box yet and won't need it for some time yet as our chicks are still young.
You can also see the beginnings of the run in the above picture. We have already dug holes where the pavers are placed for the run and coop to sit on so we don't have to worry about the wood rotting quickly.
Above is our attached run and my husband adding the roof that slants toward him for snow and rain to run off. We plan on adding a gutter and drainpipe someday so we can collect the water and use it in our garden that is to the left of the coop in this picture.
Here we have added the plywood roof and dried it in using something...I'll ask my husband what exactly. We are doing a shingle roof because it's easier for us to get the material for that and my husband is more familiar with that type of roofing over sheet metal or plastic. We covered the run which will provide a lot of shade in the hot summer sun and keep the run dry during the wet and cold months.
Adding mesh to the run. We went with 1/4" hardware cloth and have been happy so far. We also used some on the bottom of our raised beds because we've been dealing with pocket gophers and so we bought this 50' roll on Amazon and definitely recommend it.
Added a door to our run. There's only one latch on the bottom in this picture because we have to add a header above the door for the other latch. The other fenced off area is the garden and the chickens will not be given access to that unless we put them in there.
We are planning on putting peel and stick tile on the floor and adding hardware cloth to the windows so they can be open. Also planning on putting a window box with herbs or something for them to munch on below the window which gets full sun all day. So excited to get the chicks out there!
