Boat shed to chicken coop - seeking advice!

[briarandwillow]

I have an old shed at the back of my house. It's made of concrete block with a concrete pad on one side. It does have electric hookups, along with an enclosed shed for storage. I've posted a rough mockup of the building (sans roof because I don't even KNOW how to draw that yet) below. The side of the shed with dirt floor is 24' L x 10'7" wide x 7'8" tall (up to the rafters). It has a tin roof with vents above the soffits and is, at the moment, completely enclosed.

I live in Florida, so the coldest it usually gets in winter is low 30s, highs are in the 100s. It's my plan to enclose the currently open sides of the dirt half of the shed and turn that into a coop complete with hardware cloth apron, etc. I'll have to put HWC over the shed portion and make sure it's all completely "closed" off to predator access as the rafters are open over the whole deal, but I'm ok with that as it will allow me to mount things like fans, run wires, etc. Where would you put the human access? Where would you put the roosts and the nesting boxes? Because this thing is made mostly of concrete blocks, it's gonna be SUPER fun if I have to go back and readjust/move things lol. So I'd like to at least make a sensible plan.

The concrete pad half of the shed is where I park my lawn mower and store other supplies, but I do have another very large shed where I could store all of that except for the mower which will simply have to live there.

 

[pibb]

A real pic of the structure would probably show more detail but appears you may have a nice chicken setup when you're finished.

I guess I'd frame the openings on the left with 2x4s and concrete anchors and frame a human door into one of the openings and then you'll have something to secure your hardware cloth to. I would also think about framing up an outside run through one of the openings for them to get out and enjoy the sunshine.

Then I'd frame the center openings with 2x4s and osb to keep them out of the right side. You don't want them to leave you a nice doody on your lawnmower seat. You know when you crank up the mower, it will scare the dickens out of them.

As far as the nests and roosts go, just make sure you make the roosts higher than the nests probably on the inside wall.

 

[briarandwillow]

Yeah, I figured it would, which is really not ideal. It won't fit in the other shed though, and the only other outbuilding is outside the fence. I'll consider where else the mower may live and get some pictures of the actual building tomorrow.

Framing out a run is something I'd considered as there's a kind of dead space off to the "left" of the shed if you're facing it like the image that hardly gets used for anything. That's something I'd have to discuss with my dad, though, as he'd be the one helping me out lol.

I'll be back tomorrow with pics, and thanks for the suggestions about the nesting boxes!

 

[briarandwillow]

Pics of the actual building. All but the back wall on the dirt side is concrete block. The concrete block pillars have ridiculously deep concrete footers.

 

[briarandwillow]

Pardon the load of garbage. Moved in not too long ago and I'm cleaning it out. Affectionately dubbed the spider shed due to the amazing quantity of spiders literally everywhere.

 

[pibb]

The chickens are gonna want to roost in the rafters so be prepared for that.

 

[pibb]

Also if you decide to frame around the openings, you will need to pour some concrete footers there because chickens want to dig out and predators want to dig in. You could also bury the hardware cloth a foot deep.

 

[briarandwillow]

I was going to block off access to the rafters with HC in order to make sure nothing can get through from above. Thoughts?

 

[briarandwillow]

I was going to dig down 1ft to lay HC underneath and do a 2ft apron. I have moles and wild rabbits in my yard and I wanted to prohibit access to them as they tunnel through my yard pretty extensively.

 

[briarandwillow]

Another thought I just had, sorry. Predators I've seen in my area include: coyotes (lots, they do not come near my yard as my dog Chase's them off, but may be more tempted now to test the fence by easy meals), owls, hawks, eagles, fox, and while I haven't seen any raccoons here they do roam pretty extensively just 20 miles away so they are probably here too. The raccoons are why I wanted to block access to the rafters, as well as the predatory birds and anything else that might try to get in from above.