Coroplast - something new (for me) to think on.

[Maugwa]

Hi all,

I've been thinking for several months now on building a new chicken tractor. I've looked at literally hundreds of them here on BYC, and on YouTube, but haven't quite decided on exactly how I was going to go about it.

I want to make one that's quite different than any that I've seen yet. I want to make it as big as I can handle, but I'd also like to get around 10 or 12 hens and a rooster in it too. So it seems I need around 120+ ft² in the run, and I want a coop in it too that is around 48 ft². I've had many ideas, and drawn several plans on SketchUp, but they all look too heavy to work. I keep trying to imagine lighter, without getting too flimsy. I like the cattle panel idea, 4 panels (50") long by 8' wide will get the run over 130'², but can I handle it easily enough? I have an old solid tire wheel barrow that fell apart, but the wheel is good--think I'll buy another and it'll be like getting two for half price. Then mount the wheels and build just the framework with 2"x4," 2"x3", 1"x 4," furring strips, etc., leaving off all doors, end walls and coop and see how hard that is to handle, and if 2x4 base is feels sturdy enough (with 2x4 cross member under where coop begins, 6' from back wall), and possibly another in the middle of what's left. Or I may have to go with 2X6 side skids. I may have to move the wheels around some experimenting moves. I've been a mason, brick, block, and stone, for many years, which has made me pretty tuff, but those same years have made me kind of old too. I can move a lot, but I don't want it to be any harder to move than say a big wheelbarrow of mud would be.

If it's too much at this point, I may take it apart and start over using the same materials, but this time cutting it in two, and trying the same thing but three panels long. I'm pretty sure I could manage a 12'6" panel coop without all the extras in it, and with minimal ends, but a test drive will tell me for sure.

If that 3 panel works good, my next idea is to get one more cattle panel, total now of 5, and make another hoop run that's two panels long (8'4") x 8' then put a 1/2" hardware cloth floor 2' above the ground in it. My coop would now have a little over 65'² in it, and I'd have another 65'² under the run for a total of 160+'² of run. But it still has to remain as light as possible too. I've been working out of town a couple hundred miles the last few months and have thought of hundreds of ways to enclose this coop portion as lightly but as sturdy as I could, but yet have some nesting boxes, clean out doors, pop doors, etc, and I keep thinking, that all my ideas still seem pretty heavy. All that work out of town while giving me lots of time to think, has given me no time to get started yet -- which may be a good thing. I'm off again to the Black Hills tomorrow, but after watching several new videos today, I have a whole new concept to think about. A new (to me) lightweight, inexpensive building material that I never thought of before. A material that seems that no BYC or YouTube chicken coop builder has posted a build of yet, and I can see that it has some awesome potential.

It's called coroplast. I have seen it before on lawn signs, but hadn't realized yet how tuff, and weatherproof, and light and cheap, it was, what it was called, or where to get it. Check this guy out, you may be amazed -- I was. I don't think I want to move into any of his shelters, but I know some chickens who may. He's making cars and boats out of this stuff too. Look at some of his other videos too. At times he's hilarious, and full of inventions (scream bucket, lmao). There is no way to watch this stuff without thinking of chicken coops. I just found his channel today, and I'd say "Great find," and would like to share it with some fellow coop builders.

There are many more videos from this guy, and many more inventions, most with coroplast. His name is Paul Elkins on Youtube.

 

[cavemanrich]

I know you said you checked many pix of different tractors. My questions are; Does it really need to be mobile/movable???
Can raccoons easily eat their way into a tractor made from this lightweight material? Also other predators as well.
By your location, there are many possible predators. Keep this in mind when you decide to make a SAFE home for your chickens.
WISHING YOU BEST,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

 

[Maugwa]

I know you said you checked many pix of different tractors. My questions are; Does it really need to be mobile/movable???
Can raccoons easily eat their way into a tractor made from this lightweight material? Also other predators as well.
By your location, there are many possible predators. Keep this in mind when you decide to make a SAFE home for your chickens.
WISHING YOU BEST,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

I would still be using the cattle panels and hardware cloth. This coroplast I'm thinking of using would be used in my application as a skin over (or under) the various wires. I would be building my coop inside of the top four feet of a six foot high cattle panel hoop house. The coop part would be a lot lighter than the shelters shown, as my floor would have a light lumber frame and a hardware cloth floor, depending on if I go with the 8'4"x8' coop in a two section tractor (where both end walls would also still have both kinds of wire already - or at least the two that end up being exterior walls when the two part tractor was linked together would), or if I can handle the four panel, 16'8"x 8' one piece tractor, the back wall of the tractor/coop would still be secure with both wires before skinned. I don't know if the front wall of the coop with the small chicken door and ramp into the run would need wire or not, as the rest of the run is already secure. It may be though that this coroplast may be much more rigid yet if you were to glue two sheets together with hardware cloth, or metal lathe, sandwiched between, I may try that on that wall, or on the door. The price of the coroplast sheets at Home Depot drops from $22 to $14 each when you buy bundles of 10 sheets, and I'd need at least 6, so I'd be ahead by getting 10 anyway. That might be the ticket to the end walls and doors too. And if I don't use all ten sheets in the coop portion, I may use what's left putting a partial roof out over the run on the cattle panel wire cage, or at least enough of one to use what's left of the coroplast up -- I'm still just thinking, but from what I see, it seems this stuff has a much better lifespan than a blue tarp. No part of my run/coop/tractor will ever be dependent on just coroplast to stop a predator though.

 

[aart]

but from what I see, it seems this stuff has a much better lifespan than a blue tarp.

It certainly would.

I can move a lot, but I don't want it to be any harder to move than say a big wheelbarrow of mud would be.

It will be
Single tire wheelbarrow over hardscaping is a whole other story than a hoop coop with two wheels over a rough and/or soggy pasture. BTDT.

 

[Maugwa]

It certainly would.

It will be
Single tire wheelbarrow over hardscaping is a whole other story than a hoop coop with two wheels over a rough and/or soggy pasture. BTDT.

I can't remember the last time I was lucky enough to get to push a wheelbarrow over level "hardscaping", but I'll take your word for it. If it's too tuff I guess I'll drag it with my pickup, or get help and move it less often. My plan was to do the moving before I open the coop door in the morning so no chicken feet should be on the ground, and they get up to a new spot when they do come out.

 

[aart]

I can't remember the last time I was lucky enough to get to push a wheelbarrow over level "hardscaping", but I'll take your word for it.

Yeah, well, not just surface but....
the one wheel and good clearance vs two wheels attached to an 8 x ~16' frame.
It's a whole different dynamic.

One of the biggies on tractor mobility is lifting wheels enough to move without coop frame dragging/digging-in...and then finding a flat enough spot to set down that 8x16 frame without gaps that a predator could get into.

 

[Maugwa]

Yeah, well, not just surface but....
the one wheel and good clearance vs two wheels attached to an 8 x ~16' frame.
It's a whole different dynamic.

One of the biggies on tractor mobility is lifting wheels enough to move without coop frame dragging/digging-in...and then finding a flat enough spot to set down that 8x16 frame without gaps that a predator could get into.

I was planning on mounting the wheels to levers and getting it up at least 8" off the ground (another reason I'd want to move it while the chickens are in the coop section, 2' above the ground).

As for the levelness of the ground, and the predators getting in. My ground is pretty level already. There are chickens out free ranging on two acres behind my house now in the daytime and I've only lost one to a hawk so far, but there is also a big 100+ lb Red Bone Coon Hound out there with them too. He likes chickens, sometimes they roost on him, lol, but he hates everything that is furry that don't belong from bunnies and mice to coons and bobcats. He never has been on a formal nighttime coon hunt, but he has waken me up several times in the middle of the night to tell me about something in a tree he thinks I should shoot, a few times it was a real coon, but usually it's a cat. He has caught and killed several critters on his own, and who knows how many got away, or saw him first and came no closer, probably hundreds? He has been out intentionally as part of a pack, and has helped tree two Mountain Lions, not around my yard, but out in the sticks within 30 miles of here. He has a swinging door to the house, but unless it's really cold, or raining hard, he prefers spending nights outside. Even the hawk that did get a chicken didn't get to eat it, about one more second, and my dog, Scrappy, would have had the hawk. So the varmints have to get past him first.

Secondly, there is to be a coop inside my tractor too. Two feet above the ground. All secure and with it's own door that gets shut at night just like it is shut for the free ranging chickens on their coop already. Getting under the side of the tractor at night won't get the varmint any more access to those chickens in there, than walking circles around the existing hen house all night will get them access to the chickens that I already have now. It'll just get them access to the Coon Hound. And as far as daytime goes, I reckon the chickens in the run will still be safer than the ones who are out walking around outside of it.

There are a few reasons I think I need this new pen to be enclosed and as a portable tractor and don't just get more chickens and mix them with the others. If it is too heavy, like I said before, I'll split it in two and move it as two components that can be parked together as one unit, or drag it with my truck and/or helpers.

1. Even with 2 whole acres with 6' fence (privacy and chain link) around my backyard, (and 18 more acres with barbed wire for my old horse) my chickens have taking a liking to under my back deck. Yea it's shady and cool under there, I know, but I didn't help matters by throwing kitchen scraps off it either, and there are plenty of other cool, shady, sheltered places too that they seldom use. They're not really hurting anything when they are under the deck (15 hens, 1 rooster), but the problem is they start grazing there then spread from there. The result of this over the last two years is my immediate backyard is severely overgrazed, bare for the first 20', but within 100' to 150' of my deck, it looks like nothing has been touched. I want the power to say, "You will eat here today, you will eat here tomorrow," while I replant my back lawn near the house. I could even put them out with the horse.

2. My girls will be three years old soon enough. They're still laying plenty, but I don't see that improving in the future. I need to get a replacement batch underway. I figure they might as well be broke in from the beginning that they don't live under the deck too. Besides they'll still have to go through that whole growing out, juvenile, and indoctrination thing before they could join the rest anyway. A tractor pen would keep them separate before they are ready, but I don't think I ever will integrate them with the existing flock anyway -- I already have plenty of chickens under the deck.

3. I also think I'll get a new rooster and a new set of hens as far as breed goes, and keep these new ones separate from the rest for breeding reasons. As my old girls fade out in the next few years. I may make a second tractor and put the old girls in it if the first one works out well. I might even make additional tractors and try additional breeds in them in future years. I may even let them out exploring for a few hours after I get home in the evenings when I'm not trying to breed them. I may even let them come to the deck after dinner for a bit before they go back to their coops for bed, after I get the backyard regrown, but the days of chickens that never seem to get more than 100' from the back door is soon to be over. They're all out there now, they heard me come home, and they're all hoping that I come out and toss them some munchies, scavenging for anything they can find green without getting too far from the deck while they wait.