Coop floor...

[DVTO2]

I painted my coop floor with Kilz latex but I realized some sort of plastic sheeting would probably be better. I have my 4'x8' min area, plus 2'x4' poop board and three nest boxes to do. Suggestions for materials?

 

[elmo]

I use sand on the floor of my coop. Love it. But my birds are only in there at night. I use a boot tray under the roost to catch most of the poo, and a kitty litter scoop to pick up any stray poo that ends up in the sand.

Sand is probably not going to be your best bet if you live in a cold climate, because it tends to be a cold substrate in winter. Nothing to snuggle down into like shavings.

 

[newchicksnducks]

Our floors are painted plywood, covered w/4-6" of shavings. It's worked out well so far for our first year. An option I've seen and would consider using is to cover our painted floor with vynal flooring, extending the flooring up the walls 12" or so and covering the ends w/wood molding to prevent the birds from pecking and tearing at it. This would add another layer of protection from the wet.

 

[Sissy]

I use wood shavings but am working
on getting a piece of vynal to go up the wall a bit, extra
protection from mice.
I seem to be going thru more feed the usual.

 

[xyresicchick]

i plan on using a cheap sheet of vinyl for the floor and walls inside of the coop, and using regular pine shavings and straw as bedding. as time progresses i plan on using the deep litter method to help compost the droppings and i will be able to at somepoint add this to the compost pile and then to my gardens. i'm a big gardener and have everything sprouting already.

the vinyl seems like a really smart option since it is easily cleaned (why do you think it's so popular as kitchen floors?!) and it is not porous and will not be damp in the winter. the wooden molding sounds like another really good idea too

 

[DVTO2]

I found a 5 by 12 piece of linoleum for $60. It was a bit more than I wanted to spend but I wanted to finish off the coop and it was enough to do the floor, poop board, and lower walls. It looks like it will be very easy to clean.

 

[Nostalchic]

I found some vinyl at our local construction recycle center for $5, and pieced that together with a remnant from a local carpet/floor store that they sold me for $10 (floored an 8' x 14' coop). It works great but you want to have deep bedding (we use the same coarse pine shavings that we use in our horse stalls from a local sawmill) because the vinyl is a little slippery - easy to clean, but when they jump off the roost they can go skidding if they don't have enough bedding to land in. I have about 6-8" of shavings on top of the vinyl, and use a "junior" manure pick to pick up the poops under the roost every am - takes about 8 minutes.