HOOP CHICKEN PEN

[gcarmack2001]

I don't know about anybody else, but we never seem to have enough pens to hold all of the chickens we want. I have several nice pens but sometimes (like right now!) we just need to throw something together that will keep the chickens in and the predators out. I recently saw an FB post about something called a 'hoop chicken pen.' I immediately went to Pinterest and looked it up, and I can't believe I don't have a few of these littering my front yard!
Pinterest didn't show great pictures (they gave me a general idea) so I was wondering if you guys would share your pictures, dimensions, how much money it cost, etc. with me? TIA
P.S. We would be using cattle panels and tarps.

 

[Blooie]

Just click on “My Coop” under my avatar and scroll past the coop build to the run build!

 

[gcarmack2001]

Just click on “My Coop” under my avatar and scroll past the coop build to the run build!

Man, that setup is AWESOME! I love your coop and run. I don't think ours will need to be that big but that is definitely something I'm going to keep in mind. How much did it cost overall to make the hoop pen, without the decorations?

 

[PolarBerry]

Meat bird tractor in progress. Building the back solid metal as well. All the rest is 1/2 hardware cloth. As far as costs go I work at a feed/hardware store so my employee pricing is like half so I won’t be of much help there.

Will have a tarp able to put on top of the front area for bad weather but our summers can get pretty warm (hence more open for ventilation)

 

[gcarmack2001]

View attachment 1285374
Meat bird tractor in progress. Building the back solid metal as well. All the rest is 1/2 hardware cloth. As far as costs go I work at a feed/hardware store so my employee pricing is like half so I won’t be of much help there.

Will have a tarp able to put on top of the front area for bad weather but our summers can get pretty warm (hence more open for ventilation)

How heavy is it? We were wondering if it could easily be picked up and moved to a different spot.

 

[Blooie]

Shoot, I dunno...we had the steel fence posts in a pile out back, we bought the cattle panels on sale for about $18.00 each, hubby’s an electrician so he had rolls of wiring in the garage already for tying the panels to the posts.....I suppose the whole thing could probably be built for around $200 using all new materials, and most of that cost is the chicken wire over the top and the hardware cloth for the skirt and apron. But as I said, I’m not sure about that - could even have been less but he’s not here to ask.

As for the size, Well, if you don’t need it that big use two panels instead of the three we used. It’s a pretty flexible design. If you want it bigger later on, just take off the fencing at the back, add two more fence posts and another panel, wrap it, put the end back on and you’re done.

 

[gcarmack2001]

How heavy is it? We were wondering if it could easily be picked up and moved to a different spot.

Also, how would you fix it where the wind couldn't blow in on the roosting chickens underneath the tin/tarp? We have frigid winds here in the winter and that's always our main concern.

 

[PolarBerry]

2 panels and tarp vs metal roofing and 3 panels would be lighter and easier to move. Ours is somewhat heavy, lol.

 

[PolarBerry]

Also, how would you fix it where the wind couldn't blow in on the roosting chickens underneath the tin/tarp? We have frigid winds here in the winter and that's always our main concern.

I’m only using it to raise meat birds in the summer months, not in any heavy rain or snow...

 

[Blooie]

We had a wind gust of 90 mph, officially recorded by theNational Weather Service in January of last year during a snowstorm. In winter we switch out the landscape fabric we prefer in summer for shade to a clear, mesh-reinforced plastic...think greenhouse. Didn’t ruffle a feather on the chickens and even the Silkies weren’t fazed. I love the way hoops work! Now that we no longer have chickens, I will be able to continue using this for years to come. The coop will become a storage area for garden tools and the run will be a greenhouse. Not a penny of the build wasted!