Be forewarned - there are LOTS of pictures....
The coop and run before we did the plastic. We put that little lattice fence up because we live in town and our setup is visible from the street. Didn't want it to be an eyesore. Over the cattle panels we put chicken wire to keep little wild birds out. Then we put hardware cloth about 2 feet up the sides, folded it outward as an apron and used landscape staples to hold it down. Now the grass has grown in through it and it is totally invisible. Ken can mow right over it.
In this picture the fence is down and the lattice is going up over the cattle panels. We zip tied it (ties to the inside of the run, then trimmed) to the cattle panel framework and it will stay up year round as the support for both the plastic in the winter and for shade cloth in summer. It's white vinyl so it should last a long time. I made a garden arch from it 15 years ago and it still looks great. We used lattice on the run before putting plastic down because no matter how careful we tried to be in attaching the chicken wire to the panel framework, there are still lots of pokey-outy thingies where the connections were made with twisted wire. The lattice gives the plastic a smooth surface and it slid right over the lattice without snagging or catching on anything.
We used pre-drilled metal straps from Lowes, and starting at the lower edge of the plastic we rolled the plastic sheet around it like a window shade to the distance off the ground we wanted. Then we used Gorilla Tape on the front and back of that roll, right over a pre-drilled hole. We punched a hole through the front tape, the plastic, and then the back piece of plastic and tape - all the way though. We put washers on the both sides, inserted a zip tie, and pushed it through. (This way the wind stress will be handled by the tape, washer, metal strap, washer, tape "sandwich" rather than the plastic.) I was on the inside of the run and I ran the end of the zip tie around the cattle panel framework and back out to Ken, who then secured it.
Where we had the wooden frame for the door, we used clear Gorilla Tape, then a washer, and then used screws to secure it. Here you can see that the plastic we used for the front of the run is thinner than what we used for the top and south sides.....no reason for that except that we plain ran short of the 6 ml stuff and had to make do with a lighter grade here. If it works, great, if it doesn't we can fix it. But the nearest store for us to get more of the good stuff is a 100 mile drive, one way. We've learned to make do if we have to! But you can see the strap I'm referring to in this shot. The reason I'm concerned about the thinner stuff holding up is obvious - this is the only section where we can clearly see through 4 turns of the plastic.
There's a gap over the door on the north side for ventilation. The section over the tunnel - the cave which leads from the coop out to the run - is done differently, It's wrapped very loosely and then just clipped into place. That way on warm days we can roll it up like a window shade and clip it to the top of the run, and roll it back down again when we need to.
Standing on the north side of the run looking south before we put the plastic on the lattice.
Better shot of the cave leading into the coop. This is the only place where the plastic isn't taut - it's rolled very loosely, then clipped instead of zip tied. There is a lot of extra sheeting here, but it's the thinner stuff and we figured this way if we change our minds about doing this section like we did we have some extra plastic to play with because we didn't cut it to size like the rest. At this point in the process the plastic was just rolled and sitting on top of the cave...we hadn't done the final rolling and clipping yet.
Standing on the north end of the run looking south. There's a ventilation gap here too, and this entire side can roll up or down like a window shade. Despite how dark it looks (it was clouding up fast and getting late to boot) it was surprisingly warm in there.
And finally getting the lattice fence back up.
The coop and run before we did the plastic. We put that little lattice fence up because we live in town and our setup is visible from the street. Didn't want it to be an eyesore. Over the cattle panels we put chicken wire to keep little wild birds out. Then we put hardware cloth about 2 feet up the sides, folded it outward as an apron and used landscape staples to hold it down. Now the grass has grown in through it and it is totally invisible. Ken can mow right over it.
In this picture the fence is down and the lattice is going up over the cattle panels. We zip tied it (ties to the inside of the run, then trimmed) to the cattle panel framework and it will stay up year round as the support for both the plastic in the winter and for shade cloth in summer. It's white vinyl so it should last a long time. I made a garden arch from it 15 years ago and it still looks great. We used lattice on the run before putting plastic down because no matter how careful we tried to be in attaching the chicken wire to the panel framework, there are still lots of pokey-outy thingies where the connections were made with twisted wire. The lattice gives the plastic a smooth surface and it slid right over the lattice without snagging or catching on anything.
We used pre-drilled metal straps from Lowes, and starting at the lower edge of the plastic we rolled the plastic sheet around it like a window shade to the distance off the ground we wanted. Then we used Gorilla Tape on the front and back of that roll, right over a pre-drilled hole. We punched a hole through the front tape, the plastic, and then the back piece of plastic and tape - all the way though. We put washers on the both sides, inserted a zip tie, and pushed it through. (This way the wind stress will be handled by the tape, washer, metal strap, washer, tape "sandwich" rather than the plastic.) I was on the inside of the run and I ran the end of the zip tie around the cattle panel framework and back out to Ken, who then secured it.
Where we had the wooden frame for the door, we used clear Gorilla Tape, then a washer, and then used screws to secure it. Here you can see that the plastic we used for the front of the run is thinner than what we used for the top and south sides.....no reason for that except that we plain ran short of the 6 ml stuff and had to make do with a lighter grade here. If it works, great, if it doesn't we can fix it. But the nearest store for us to get more of the good stuff is a 100 mile drive, one way. We've learned to make do if we have to! But you can see the strap I'm referring to in this shot. The reason I'm concerned about the thinner stuff holding up is obvious - this is the only section where we can clearly see through 4 turns of the plastic.
There's a gap over the door on the north side for ventilation. The section over the tunnel - the cave which leads from the coop out to the run - is done differently, It's wrapped very loosely and then just clipped into place. That way on warm days we can roll it up like a window shade and clip it to the top of the run, and roll it back down again when we need to.
Standing on the north side of the run looking south before we put the plastic on the lattice.
Better shot of the cave leading into the coop. This is the only place where the plastic isn't taut - it's rolled very loosely, then clipped instead of zip tied. There is a lot of extra sheeting here, but it's the thinner stuff and we figured this way if we change our minds about doing this section like we did we have some extra plastic to play with because we didn't cut it to size like the rest. At this point in the process the plastic was just rolled and sitting on top of the cave...we hadn't done the final rolling and clipping yet.
Standing on the north end of the run looking south. There's a ventilation gap here too, and this entire side can roll up or down like a window shade. Despite how dark it looks (it was clouding up fast and getting late to boot) it was surprisingly warm in there.
And finally getting the lattice fence back up.
