henhouse 6' x 5' x 3' high ?'s

[cptbahama]

1- Given the dimensions of the henhouse (coop is 6' x 12' x 6' tall), how high off the floor of the henhouse should the roosts be? Remember the henhouse is 3' tall.

2- Again, with a henhouse that is 3' tall, how high off the floor of the henhouse should the nest boxes be? Or can they just set on the floor of the henhouse?

3- Given the height of the coop, how high should the roosts be off the ground? I understand they may not use the roost outside the henhouse.

4- How high and wide should the open door to the henhouse be? I'm referring to the permanently open door the hens will be using to enter and exit the henhouse. We're getting standard size hens.

 

[MyKidLuvsGreenEgz]

Quote:
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ROOST: Depends on breed. I stagger for my eggers and australorps ... 3', 4', 5', and could probably go higher. Once I had 2 buff orpingtons who had clipped wings and had troubles flying. Roosts for them started at 1', then 2' and so on so they could "hop" to the top. My birds will find almost anything to fly to, to roost on. Yesterday, one of my eggers made it to the top of a 6'-tall fence!

NEST BOXES: I have one group who uses nestboxes at about 3' but there's another one who prefers to lay by herself on a top shelf at around 5! I really wouldn't advise leaving them flat on the ground if you have a predator problem (like mice/rats, snakes, etc.)

DOORS: Human door or chicken door? Assuming chicken door ... big enough for your biggest chicken, I'd say. But are you sure you want it to stay open? Even in winter? At night? Where any predator can come in?

Just my thoughts.

Amateur Chick-a-holic

 

[patandchickens]

Quote:
Are you suuuuuuuure you want to do that? YOu will have no way of catching chickens in there unless you crawl in with them (I don't even want to think how unpleasant that would be) and even just *cleaning* will be impossible without either having access hatches on *both* sides of the 6' dimension or actually crawling in there. Inability to catch chickens without crawling in there is a biiiig problem. Someday you *will* need to.

(Or am I misunderstanding, and the actual house part will only be a fraction of that size?)

Reach-in coops are generally not more than 3-4' wide, for exactly this reason. (Even 4' is pushing it, b/c to reach the far side/corners you will be leaning your belly on the bedding at the edge fo the doorway)

3- Given the height of the coop, how high should the roosts be off the ground? I understand they may not use the roost outside the henhouse.

As a general answer, in a 3' high coop I would suggest the coops be maybe 14" off the floor if the chickens are not-unusually-large, lower if they are unusually large breeds.

2- Again, with a henhouse that is 3' tall, how high off the floor of the henhouse should the nest boxes be? Or can they just set on the floor of the henhouse?

You'll pretty much have to have them floor level, to ensure they're distinctly lower than the roosts.

4- How high and wide should the open door to the henhouse be? I'm referring to the permanently open door the hens will be using to enter and exit the henhouse. We're getting standard size hens.

Maybe 6-12" above the floor, depending how mcuh bedding you think you will ever have in there.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat​

 

[elmo]

3 feet high is a very low coop. It's going to be very hard to put a vent in a coop that short up above roost level, isn't it? I have a small raised coop with walls that are 4 feet high and have vents up above 4 feet, and a roost at about 18 inches. But I have tiny bantams that aren't any taller than about 12" even when they stretch up, so that's how this setup works for me.

I also second the advice about the depth of a raised coop. Mine is 4 feet deep and has a front wall that opens up completely. I can pretty easily reach almost to the back of the coop without climbing in, but not any further than that.

 

[patandchickens]

If I were building a 3' high coop in an area that got coldish winters, I would not be trying to put the winter-type vents anywhere near the roost at all (although some should probably be for *summertime* use) -- I would be putting most or all of the vents that will be open in winter at the opposite end of the house from the roost. In a real cold climate (pardon me for being too lazy to page back and see where the o.p. lives

) this argues for a long-rectangular shape house rather than squarish, so there is ample room to separate the roost and the wintertime ventilation.

I don't know as there's anything magic about vents higher than roosts btw, certainly not in winter; the big thing IMHO is to have the vents as high up as possible. (And additional vents openable for summer)

Pat

 

[teach1rusl]

Quote:
Anything in the range of 12h x 10w" should work...could be a little bigger if you wish. Whether you leave it permanently open or not should probably depend on how secure your run is or your potential predator situation.

okay...that's strange.

 

[elmo]

Quote:
I thought the idea of putting the vent up higher than the roost was so that should a gust of wind blow in the vent it wouldn't be blowing right onto the roosting chickens.

 

[patandchickens]

Meh, I dunno, if there is wind blowing straight in your vent it really doesn't matter all that much where the chickens are roosting as there will be air movement everywhere unless the coop is large (hence the value of having enough different walls w/vents that you can adjust according to the weathervane).

JME,

Pat

 

[gsim]

Pretty tough to do what you want with a coop only 3 ft tall. I would not build one that low for the very reason that ventilation is going to be a problem. I would do nests on the floor and roosts no more than 6"-12" so that the chooks are not roosting up where the vents are and are not too near to all of that radiated roof heat either. Pat and Chickens offers good advice too. See her page and see my page too for ventilations ideas. I allowed 1 sq ft non-closeable ventilation for each 4 chooks. Since I started with 25, I have around 6 sq ft full-time always open ventilation. I have 4 windows to boot for warmer weather that are roost ht and lower for controlling coop temp. Drafts at roost ht are very desireable in warm weather, but not at all in cold weather.

Gerry

 

[cptbahama]

Sorry folks, I don't think I was very clear in describing my set-up. I'm going to re-post with modified questions and pictures.