Chicken Coop Design - Questions...

Wilmingtech · Jun 2, 2017

Ridgerunner said:
A 4x6 coop for a dozen chickens is extremely small. How do you plan on putting enough roosts in there without them pooping in any food or water in there? I don't know where you are located (interest is climate) but if you have any weather at all where they are pretty much locked in the coop by itself for any length of time, you could have serious behavioral problems. You need to be able to reach every part of the inside of the coop for many different reasons. You might want to follow the link in my signature for some of my thoughts on why more space just might be better. If you are planning on keeping all 12 I'd want a walk-in coop. It's just so much more convenient for you. Make it big enough so you can work in there and it will fit your chickens much better.

Do you know the sex of your 12? For 12 hens 3 nests should be enough.

I'd certainly want a run tall enough you can stand up in, but if you are building your run to be a tractor also you don't want it to be too heavy to move. There might be some trade-offs there. Maybe consider a permanent run with a separate tractor you can attach to that.

My main objection to a door in the coop floor is that the bedding falls out. They also reduce the effective floor space in the coop.

For doors between the tractor and the coop or run, consider a guillotine type door. Many years ago I had a tractor that was in two parts to make the sections lighter and easier to move. I used guillotine type doors to lock the chickens in when they were being moved. it didn't take me long to scratch the idea of a tractor, moving it became too much of a time commitment.

Thanks for the comments. As these chickens get bigger and bigger I agree that we are short on space. We do have a large yard and let the chickens free roam for a few hours each day. We do have to be wary of Hawks and Eagles though as there are quite a few where we live (Big Bottom Valley area in WA State).

When I first started planning this project I read somewhere (maybe here) and my wife told me as well that we need at least 2sf per chicken. So that was what I based the plans on. I knew if I added more SF she would buy more chickens. But now I am seeing that 3 or 4sf per chick might be a little more comfy for them. Although most of the time when they are in the coop they seem to be all piled on top of one another anyways. The kids spoil them as pets. Every single one is named and held and petted and loved. Never thought chickens would make cuddly pets.

For now we will try our best to make the space work. We can reach every part of the coop. The 2 doors on the side swing open and the bottom door (when finished) will drop down allowing us to completely dump the coop into a wheelbarrel when we need to clean it out. The run is movable so that can be easily accessed as well. I think the most difficult part will be accessing under the coop when its done being built. Maybe I should make a swing out door for one side on that.

All great ideas. I'll have to see about a side/guillotine door. I am going to have to engineer some kind of chicken staircase to get them down and around to the bottom of the condo. I think I'll have to add a few more roosts to the area as well. Just finished the chicken run yesterday and I'll put some roosts in that as well as under the coop. Good point about feeder location. The water is planned and out of the way but didn't put too much thought into the feeder placement.

The 12 chickens - Well its actually 13. We are currently assuming that 2 are roosters. One is a bantam that we are raising for a friend who didn't want to incorporate the rooster as a chick into her full grown flock. And we have another that my wife had to have (it was the last "chocolate egg layer" at the store, assuming its a maran) that we think is a rooster. Probably why it was the last one at the store.

We will get rid of the roosters so we should have only 11 when all is said and done.

Here are a few more pics of the work in progress -

The Coop being framed up-