"Green roof" for my coop

[kellykungfu]

Hi Everyone,

I would like to incorporate a "green roof" for my coop that is currentlyYourLinkGoesHere in progress. I'll like to put down a rubber shower liner and then on top of that maybe 2-3 inches of soil to grow grass or plants of some sort.

Is 2-3 inches enough for grass to grow? And if anyone has a cheaper solution than the shower liner (its in the hardware section of Home Depot) because its about 6 bucks for a 1 foot by 5 foot section and I'm planning on covering a 4 x 8 sheet of plywood.

Thanks,
kelly

 

[SimplyForties]

Hi Kelly - I'll be interested to see your responses. I've been thinking about doing a green roof myself but haven't really looked into it much yet. If you use a shower liner with dirt on the top, how would the drainage work? Do you have a sloped roof? If not, you might need to incorporate some gravel in there under the dirt.

 

[lux_interior]

I think for those, you're supposed to have tons of layers... like plexi glass on the bottom, then some rocks, sand, dirt and so on... it would be cool though, I've wanted to do one too

 

[coffeelady3]

Here's a couple of links for other green roof discussions....

https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=65644&p=1

https://www.backyardchickens.com/web/viewblog.php?id=7019-

 

[kellykungfu]

Hi Folks,

Thanks for the replies. I was at Lowes today and they didn't have the shower membrane that Home Depot had. The one at Home Depot was pretty thick, must of been about 1/8 (or a tad thinner).

I had a brilliant and cheap idea. Linoleum is cheap and cheap enough to do two layers of. The roof on my coop is sloped and i was thinking about putting recycled redwood for the sides and then have some rolled up chicken wire placed every so often to hold the soil from washing away. As soon as I have some pictures I'll post.

Also on the other side of sloped roof. I'm planning a soda/beer can roof. Heres a link to one of my favorite sites for DIY (do it yourself) things.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Make-Shingles-and-Siding-Out-of-Aluminum-Cans-Bee/

So, once again, whats the minimum depth of soil needed to grow grass?


Thanks in advance.

-kelly

 

[chickenwhisperer123]

Quote:
I dont know anything about greed roofs, but wanted to say that the can thing is really cool!!

 

[annek]

You don't want to use linoleum unless you want a leaky roof in a few years. Go with the shower membrane or use the thick rubber that they use in making pond liners or even the rubber membrane that is made for flat roofs. Don't put any nails through it. Personally I wouldn't go a with a green roof, wet soil/snow is very heavy. If you are going to do this you better beef up your framing or you will have smashed chickens one day.

 

[New adventure]

I think I would go with pond liner, and the rolled up wire sounds like a good idea. You can grow grass in 2-3" soil easily. Buffalo grass would be good cuz it doesn't get more than 4 or 5" tall.

 

[Kansaseq]

Quote:
I LOVE the soda can idea! May have to look into that a little more. But do they really have to be put into the dye thingie? Couldn't you just use them flat??? I really wanna know.............

 

[kellykungfu]

The die thingy is used to make each of the sheets more ridged. Also, it makes it so it can overlap the next one and be more uniform like real metal roofing.

I live near the beach so wanted stainless steel staples for the staple gun to attach the cans. Couldn't find it at Sears, Home Depot or Lowes. Oh well.

-kelly