First coop upgrade

[abbygibson1212]

Just added on to my coop for the first time, thanks to chicken math. I bought this coop from orschelns and started out with three chickens.

Now I have ten chickens, so we had to add on, this addition gives us about 3 sq feet per chicken, in the run, and I let them out to free range on nice days, hopefully this lasts them until I'm able to build a much, much bigger, permanent coop.

We've only got two chickens laying right now, so if everyone else could start laying soon so that it doesn't feel like I'm doing all this work for a bunch of lazy freeloaders, that would be great

 

[junebuggena]

How much roosting space is inside. In the middle of summer, you don't want them all jammed onto one roost with no room between birds. That's a recipe for heat stressed chickens.

 

[abbygibson1212]

@junebuggena not a whole lot, there's two roosts, and the two oldest chickens roost in the nesting boxes for some reason, drives me crazy but I can't get them to stop. But I'm trying to figure out a way to give them more space for roosting at night, I might cover one end in metal and build something inside of that that has a few places to roost on

 

[junebuggena]

Are the roosts at the same height or lower than the nest boxes? The highest ranking chickens will roost as high as they can get. If that place happens to be the nest boxes, that is where they will sleep. Also, an adult hen will be more comfortable on a wider roost. Chickens can't grip perches with their feet like other birds. They prefer to sleep with their feet flat. If your roosts are only two inches wide, that might be why they don't want to use them.

 

[abbygibson1212]

@junebuggena They're the same height, but the roosts are only an inch or two, that's the way I bought it. They shouldn't have too stay in here much longer though. I'm in the process of moving from in town to some land out in the country, and when I get there I'm going to build a permanent coop, it'll be a 12 x 12 metal storage shed, and I'm going to put good vents in it, big roosts on one side and nest boxes on the other, also hang up their feed and waterers so they'll stop scratching stuff into them, also put sand on the floor, and I'll be building them a 12 x 18-20 ish run. And they'll still get to free range when it's nice out. And I'll have plenty of room for more chickens. This should work right?

 

[junebuggena]

Make sure to put in several roosts at different heights. And make sure the nest boxes are a good bit lower than the roosts. That should solve the problem of the hens sleeping in the nest boxes. It seems that right now, your big girls don't really have any other option.

 

[abbygibson1212]

@junebuggena Okay, thanks for the advice!

 

[aart]

You added to the run but not the coop and the coop needs to be bigger also....alot bigger for 10 chickens(poor chickens).
The reason your chickens are roosting in the nest is, there's no where else to roost.

12 x 12 sounds much better, hope it happens soon!

 

[Ol Grey Mare]

You added to the run but not the coop and the coop needs to be bigger also....alot bigger for 10 chickens(poor chickens).
The reason your chickens are roosting in the nest is, there's no where else to roost.

12 x 12 sounds much better, hope it happens soon!

x2

 

[abbygibson1212]

@aart @Ol Grey Mare It should happen pretty soon! And on the bright side only two of the chickens are full grown, so all the rest are relatively small still and don't take up much space, and two of them are bantams as well. But obviously this won't be their permanent home