Confused Newbie with 2 main questions please.

[coolcanoechic]

Hi Nancy. WOW! I love your coop! I love all the attention to detail you did, very nice. Especially love that decorative little balcony and the glass door. You're storage space is awesome too. Definitely very inspiring.

Kim

Thanks so much!

I'm very proud of it. My hubby and I spent months building it, and the girls are very cozy in there. It is a bit dirtier now than in the pictures. The chickens can get very messy indeed! They just love scratching up a storm all day long. I have actually switched from sand inside of the coop to straw. The sand was raising such a cloud of dust when they scratched, I thought it might hurt their lungs, especially since I had some DE mixed in there. I didn't want them getting sick. There are only 2 of them, so the chopped straw I am using now works nice for them. It stays dry and the inside of the coop actually smells like sweet hay all the time.
I would love to see pictures of your progress as you build your coop. Please keep us all up to date on your progress. We love this stuff!

 

[navychick]

Our nesting boxes are at floor level and we have no problems. You might need to put a board across the front to keep "nesting material" in and litter/sand out though. Here is a link to our coop. https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/navychicks-page

 

[judyki2004]

Hi Kim,
Welcome!

My girls have liked their arrangement with low nesting boxes and the roost just above. The coop is small and I set it up this way for convenience in cleaning and collecting eggs from the outside.
Check out my page and look at the set up I have. It works well for me.
Nancy

What a wonderful coop! Love all the detaiils, specially the poop deck! lol
@ Kim.

I'm new too, and like Nancy I got 2 grown hens, but also a Roo just a week ago, I did the nest at floor level ... so far no problem, actually they only use one of the nests, check out my coop page... I know you will have a big flock, but anyway :O)

, Judy

 

[NewChickHere]

@NavyChick....wow yours is beautiful too! Ok, I think I need to find the Ghetto Coops section or something.

. You guys are making me want to make sure my chickens never see these pictures. I love the color and the sign etc. Your yard looks so nice too, not what I would think it would if chickens were foraging around it. I'm very glad to hear from you and Judy that they nest fine on the ground. My husband has worked so hard today on his day off and we have had rain off and on all day. The more we look at it the more it seems the nests will fit better on the ground for us, as long as it is ok for the girls. And I do agree NavyChick about a little edge of sorts to help keep the hay inside better. I think they will be cozier too.

@Judy, I see you have used some PVC pipes, is there a fencing around it? I cant see it real well so just asking. So me and you are in the same boat with being new Feather mommies huh? Are your grown hens nice? I am really looking forward to us raising ours from chicks, mostly for my sons experience but mine too really. They are so darned cute! I imagine we will be playing with them a lot.

 

[Charm1704]

Here is a picture of my nest boxes they are about 3 ft. off the ground, DH
cut a piece of plywood to lat across the top and I put hay in them and the hens really seem to like them, ~Charm1704

 

[Trefoil]

Nancy- The hen must have died from shock. That is a beautiful coop. My nest boxes are larger and on the floor of the coop, but my birds don't lay in them very reliably. I'm not sure why. If you use 1/2" hardware cloth and bury it around the perimeter, you shouldn't have any problems with predators.

 

[chics in the sun]

I have two nest boxes built right into the ground, with a roof on hinges that I open up to get the eggs. Those are 14 x 14. I had a third nest box that was built into a brooderbox, which was only 12x 11. I dont need that now since I re-did my entire coop, but when I did, they ALL used the one small nest box, go figure.

 

[judyki2004]

The run is framed in 3/4 in pvc pipes, I used a green, plastic chicken wire & attached it with plastic straps, it was quite easy and fast to do, and stronger than one may think...
I wanted to start from chicks, but I work so It was not that practical unless I wait until next vacation so when a friend offer to sell me part of his flock I though it was a good opportunity they are quite young, started laying last summer... they are good chickens, the roo craw all the time, but is a gentleman with the 2 hens, always let them eat first and is gorgeous with his black,white & gold feathers!!!. They are calm and happy (and gave me 11 eggs in 8 days) but I guess it will take some time before they let me "pet" them,

@ NavyChick, your EggPlant Coop is absolutely gorgeous as well as your garden! I was post a comment in your page before :O)

 

[ridgewood chickens]

My nest boxes are 12" wide by 12" long, with a sloping roof on top that goes from 18" in the back to 12" in the front. My Rhode Island Reds are fairly large and fit perfectly into these, have been laying since November with no problems. I do have the 4 boxes raised about 18" off the floor which makes it a little easier to get the eggs and also I can clean underneath them. Only problem I have had with that arrangement is that about once a week, one of the hens will make a nest underneath the boxes and lay an egg there, and it's really difficult to reach underneath and get it! Good luck with your project!

 

[Barrdwing]

Our girls are in a tiny ancient barn right now (talk about your ghetto coops--the roof leaks so badly in one area we have a tarp strung underneath the hole). They have two sets of nest boxes: three covered cat litterboxes, and a store-bought set of four attached boxes each 12"X12"X12". The store-bought ones have gotten mixed reviews from the hens. We started out with the cat litterboxes on the floor, but because of the leaky roof I soon had problems with the bedding being constantly wet underneath. So I built a rack out of scrap lumber and raised the litterboxes about six inches off the ground. The hens can hop up into them no problem. They love the litterboxes: I'd say 95% of our eggs are laid in those, and it's not unusual to have one hen peering into a box at a second hen rousing her feathers and cussing a blue streak: "I'm NOT done yet! Get lost!"

The four 12"X12"X12" boxes are up on the second level, about 3 feet off the ground. When spring rolls around the bantams will start using those because they want to go broody and there's less competition up there. But right now I'm having some trouble with the youngest hens sleeping in those boxes. I guess they're high enough, and it's chilly enough, that they look very inviting. Hardly anybody has laid in them for months: once the majority of the flock went on "laycation," the competition for the litterboxes decreased so much that there wasn't any real demand.

One problem that we have had is that we stored our straw on a pallet in the corner with a tarp draped over it. The pallet is raised up on four cinderblocks set on end so that the hens can get in under there and scratch for bugs. Unfortunately some of our free thinkers have decided that it's a great place to hide a nest. So every night we have to get the rake out and poke around under there to fish out a few eggs. That's kind of a pain in the neck. I think next coop we build, I'm going to build them a "tunnel nest" and see what they think of that.