Did you glue your vinyl flooring to the bottom of the coop?

[EweSheep]

EweSheep, where do you get horse rubber mats! how long have you used them? how big are they?

Any farm store would have them. I get mine from Menard's, which it was really a people rubber mat which has lasted me over seven years and still going strong before the mice gnawed holes in it from the bottom (my fault, for not putting hardware wire on bottom so that the mice don't gnaw the wood subflooring). I just recently replaced it with truck bed rubber mat last year and it looked just as good as my original rubber mats. No glue downs, just lay them down. I took a shovel to it a few times and it didn't even faze it. I had washed rubber mats as well and it cleaned out GOOD! (I have a resin shed which the metal tack down lays on top of the rubber mat so I don't have to worry about rot. Be sure to overlap a few inches past your wood foundation so it will drain the water out of it. Or if you have a regular shed, no washings needed, just a stiff brush to remove caked down manure (like you do for horse stalls).

 

[cravenchx]

We used a staple gun. The horse rubber mats are probably
way more expensive that a remnant of linoleum

 

[EweSheep]

We used a staple gun. The horse rubber mats are probably
way more expensive that a remnant of linoleum

Well if you had to replace the lino a few times, it would add up to that much. I rather have durablity rather than spending to replace linos, IMO. I've had friends that had linos for their coops, finding out they have to replace it within a year or two. So they laid the mats on top of the lino and no problems since then.

Horse mats take the abuse so much better than lino.

 

[ridgewood chickens]

I cut a piece of linoleum to fit the inside dimensions of my coop, I did not glue, nail, or otherwise attach it, and I keep it covered with at least 6" of pine shavings. Has been in coop approximately 6 months and works extremely well. The reason I didn't attach it was so that I could actually pull it out for cleaning if I wanted to, although I anticipate doing that only once or twice a year.

 

[RoostersCrow HensDeliver!]

I hope your coop has minimum chicken traffic. I learned the hard way not to lay lanolium in a coop occupied by many chickens Everything was fine for the first six months, then one evening I went into the coop to find that my hens had scratched through the lanolium near their pop hole. It happened to be raining all day and the wood floor underneath was soaked all the to the other side of the coop. I had to rip everything up.

 

[ridgewood chickens]

I think the thick layer of shavings that I have on the floor pretty much takes care of that - they hardly ever seem to dig all the way through the shavings for any reason, except once-a-while they do near their feed area. They also don't seem to spend a lot of time inside, preferring to be out in the run most of the day, although now that winter is setting in that may change. We'll see what happens, but happy with the linoleum so far.

 

[cravenchx]

I think the thick layer of shavings that I have on the floor pretty much takes care of that - they hardly ever seem to dig all the way through the shavings for any reason, except once-a-while they do near their feed area. They also don't seem to spend a lot of time inside, preferring to be out in the run most of the day, although now that winter is setting in that may change. We'll see what happens, but happy with the linoleum so far.

x's 2

 

[EweSheep]

Im not sure if kids rubber playmats would work (those colorful jigsaw things), never had them, just an idea if you do come across with one that could be found on Freecycle or Craiglist.

Also any used shop mats would work as well!

 

[JackE]

You want something that will REALLY stand up to the rigors of coop life. Scrap the linoleum and vinyl and put something really bullet proof on your floor. I use a rubberized roof coat product I got from Lowes. Pour it out onto the floor and push it around with a roller. It totally seals all floor cracks and gaps, plus the gap where the wall and floor meet. Chickens couldn't damage this stuff in a hundred years. I clean out my coop with an old coal shovel and don't have to worry about tearing my floor covering up. This stuff bonds to the floor, nothing can get under it, unlike vinyl or linoleum.
Jack

 

[Cowgirl75446]

I don't think linoleum would hold up very well in a chicken coop.