e2l4
In the Brooder
Hello from western Maine! Potential new chicken tender here. That will depend entirely on my coop-building success 
Currently working on building a low to no cost coop out of pallets and scrap lumber. If I can build a decent enough coop then I’ll move on into the investment of chicken wire and hardware cloth because holy $$$ batman.
Our house came with an old, hard packed, 6 foot chain link fenced, overgrown former garden that I’m planning to roof with chicken wire for a daytime run. The good and bad of that space is that it’s roughly 30’x16’. That’s a lot of chicken wire roof.
More fun problem solving. Abutting the back of the house/a basement window is a concrete pad (old sealed well) where I can build a coop that is accessible through the basement window for winter eggs/food/water tending. Not that I don’t like bounding through 3 feet of snow to get to the back of the house, but this seemed easier so I’ll also be building a semi permanent pallet chicken tunnel from coop to run since that pad is about 15 feet from the garden and we’ll need to be able to move the tunnel once in awhile to go through there.
I’m trying to do it all as cheaply as possible but also enough to last about a year and a half. Planning on buying pullets from my local friend this fall, then having a solid year of chickening to determine whether it’s just an impossible fit for our family or if we want to continue, plus then an extra winter to plan/save for a more long-term structure. If our family doesn’t do well with chickens then they’ll go back to my local friend and her flock
Oh. And while we 100% have coyote, fox, and raccoons here, there’s also a decent chance of black bear. We back the woods on the edge of town, and they’ve been sighted for sure on the other side of town. So no pressure in building an upcycled/mostly free coop that’s potentially bear proof
TLDR: might get chickens this fall, here to learn about what has/hasn’t worked for others with budget coop experiments.
Currently working on building a low to no cost coop out of pallets and scrap lumber. If I can build a decent enough coop then I’ll move on into the investment of chicken wire and hardware cloth because holy $$$ batman. Our house came with an old, hard packed, 6 foot chain link fenced, overgrown former garden that I’m planning to roof with chicken wire for a daytime run. The good and bad of that space is that it’s roughly 30’x16’. That’s a lot of chicken wire roof.
More fun problem solving. Abutting the back of the house/a basement window is a concrete pad (old sealed well) where I can build a coop that is accessible through the basement window for winter eggs/food/water tending. Not that I don’t like bounding through 3 feet of snow to get to the back of the house, but this seemed easier
so I’ll also be building a semi permanent pallet chicken tunnel from coop to run since that pad is about 15 feet from the garden and we’ll need to be able to move the tunnel once in awhile to go through there.I’m trying to do it all as cheaply as possible but also enough to last about a year and a half. Planning on buying pullets from my local friend this fall, then having a solid year of chickening to determine whether it’s just an impossible fit for our family or if we want to continue, plus then an extra winter to plan/save for a more long-term structure. If our family doesn’t do well with chickens then they’ll go back to my local friend and her flock
Oh. And while we 100% have coyote, fox, and raccoons here, there’s also a decent chance of black bear. We back the woods on the edge of town, and they’ve been sighted for sure on the other side of town. So no pressure in building an upcycled/mostly free coop that’s potentially bear proof
TLDR: might get chickens this fall, here to learn about what has/hasn’t worked for others with budget coop experiments.
Glad you joined.
