Help with designing a walk in coop/shed

[BigBlueHen53]

How will you manage the poop? Will you have poop boards under the roosts? Can you get in to clean them? Where will the nests be? Under the roosts, one assumes. Can you get to the nests easily in order to gather the eggs? Will there be enough light to see to clean and gather eggs? I ask because I ended up adding lights in my coop so I could see better in the corners for cleaning and finding eggs, which occasionally get laid in corners on the floor UNDER the nests, those naughty girls!

 

[1Anjl]

A 4x8 is the largest I'd build that was not a walk-in. You need to be able to reach everywhere inside so build access doors, probably from inside that shed.


I would for lighting. You should get quite a bit of light from that venting but I'd probably put one on the back wall. It won't hurt and might help on those dark dreary days of winter.


I lived in Northwest Arkansas and had chickens. I think that should be enough venting. Just make sure the wind does not blow on them when they are on the roosts.


Can your chickens fly? If they can fly, they can fly up that high, even without a ramp, if they want to. If you have some that can't fly, like Silkies, they can still be trained to use a ramp. The trick is to teach them that the coop is where they want to sleep.

It has been a while but there are some older threads on this forum where people had openings that high. I remember one that the coop was in the upstairs of a barn with chicken access through a wall.


Aart makes a good point about the dust but it sounds like that doesn't concern you with what you plan to have in there. I had a lot of ventilation on the interior wall when I closed off the end of a shed to build my coop. Depending on how drafty it actually is you might consider closing off the lower section of the coop and having the top part open.


How do you plan on providing heat to your brooder? Lighting is convenient but you don't need it. I did not heat my coop in NW Arkansas either but I did have a built-in brooder and needed electricity for that.


How high is up? How far away is far away? Yours is another question that doesn't have a fixed answer. I've seen different guidelines on this forum. The trendy guidelines right now are for 4 square feet per chicken in the coop and 10 square feet in the run. These work for the majority of people provided you don't integrate. But occasionally they are too tight. You should have weather where they can be outside all day practically every day. I don't know what you plan as far as a run goes or how much you will keep them locked in the coop only.

If you have to have a number I'd say no more than 8. But I kind of cringe when someone asks how many chickens can I shoehorn into this space. I'd prefer to look at it as how many chickens do I want and then decide how I can provide enough room for them.

Thank you! I dont have chickens yet. I was planning on 6 or 7 chickens, but Im a bit too experienced in chicken math (started with 10 before and had 28 by the time I moved!) but I also had a lot more space for them back then.
I have a 200 ft run, but also plan to free range them as much as possible.
Someone else gave me the idea to keep a 4x4 space on the ground floor for the main coop and just have a brooder under the perch area. So that will eliminate the need for a tall pop door.

Re brooder heat, I dont plan on raising day old chicks often. I realize I may need to raise a few to get my flock started, they will be in a make shift brooder in my shop. I wanted a brooder area in the coop in case of a broody hen. I prefer to just let them do the work of raising the babies.

I will be out working on the coop today and post better photos of the interior as I progress.

 

[1Anjl]

How will you manage the poop? Will you have poop boards under the roosts? Can you get in to clean them? Where will the nests be? Under the roosts, one assumes. Can you get to the nests easily in order to gather the eggs? Will there be enough light to see to clean and gather eggs? I ask because I ended up adding lights in my coop so I could see better in the corners for cleaning and finding eggs, which occasionally get laid in corners on the floor UNDER the nests, those naughty girls!

I had never heard of poop boards until I joined this forum last week and honestly I like that idea. I need to research better to figure out how I would do it though.
Ive decided to forego the quarantine/separation area and make a man door on the inside into the coop (more like a screen door) so I will be able to better clean it and also reach all areas. So Im thinking perches above the brooder area with poop boards under.
Nesting boxes will be to the left of the door and they will be roll away boxes that I can access from outside of the coop.
Good point on lights for cleaning. my shop is only about 10 ft away from the coop so I could run and extension cord if needed I guess. Or I could do solar lighting. Now you got me thinking hehe

 

[Ted Brown]

I do have some concerns about your plan of raising the coop portion 4 feet. The pop door will be so high up it might discourage the chickens from going up there. Or it might not. I don't have experience with such a high ramp.
...

Inside my coop I removed my ramp and went with random trunk sections of increasing size (across shed face or other arrangement). Chickens like to jump/fly and this increases their exercise content.

 

[Ridgerunner]

So Im thinking perches above the brooder area with poop boards under.

My 3x6 brooder is under the roosts. The solid plywood top of the brooder is the droppings board. The ventilation on my brooder is on the sides, not the top.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

I had never heard of poop boards until I joined this forum last week and honestly I like that idea. I need to research better to figure out how I would do it though.
Ive decided to forego the quarantine/separation area and make a man door on the inside into the coop (more like a screen door) so I will be able to better clean it and also reach all areas. So Im thinking perches above the brooder area with poop boards under.
Nesting boxes will be to the left of the door and they will be roll away boxes that I can access from outside of the coop.
Good point on lights for cleaning. my shop is only about 10 ft away from the coop so I could run and extension cord if needed I guess. Or I could do solar lighting. Now you got me thinking hehe

Lol, you are benefitting from the myriad mistakes I made in ignorance in having my coop built! Oh and foundation? I had my coop set on bare ground here in SE MO which gets LOTS of rain and moisture, bad plan, very bad plan. I am originally from NW NM where the ground is dry and stays put like concrete. My coop now lists like a drunken sailor and the door no longer hangs square and plumb, but there is not much I can do about it.

 

[1Anjl]

Lol, you are benefitting from the myriad mistakes I made in ignorance in having my coop built! Oh and foundation? I had my coop set on bare ground here in SE MO which gets LOTS of rain and moisture, bad plan, very bad plan. I am originally from NW NM where the ground is dry and stays put like concrete. My coop now lists like a drunken sailor and the door no longer hangs square and plumb, but there is not much I can do about it.

I wish I would have known that when I started this coop last month! I just set mine on blocks because the ground was frozen and I didnt feel like fighting the auger LOL. I guess if it starts to sink I can always jack it up and put more blocks under it. sighs

 

[BigBlueHen53]

And so we live and learn!

 

[1Anjl]

Ok here is what I got accomplished today. Honestly not much because it was a beautiful 70* day so I mostly played in the sunshine with my fur babies. Brooder will be on the bottom. Roosts above. Man door on the left and a pop door on the bottom left. So hens will have roost area plus 4x4 on the ground floor. Back at it tomorrow after I replenish my wood supply lol. Nesting boxes will be on the outside of the coop directly across from their roosts.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

Looks good!