How much head room?

[FelixFelicis]

Hi, we're building our coop from an old play house within an enclosed run. The run will be 6 ft tall and will have a roof. Our problem is, the play house is currently 8ft tall! It sits on stilts, so in order to make it fit within the run we have two options. option one, take away the stilts completely and have the coop sat directly on the ground with damp proof course under it. This isn't ideal as the wood will rot quicker and it will take up a lot of the run space. Option two is to cut the legs down to make it fit so that the coop isn't in direct contact with the ground and the chickens will still have use of the full run space. However this will only leave about 13 inches under the coop. Would this be high enough for the chickens to run around under? is it worth it? We're thinking of getting orpingtons or similar larger birds.

Thanks for the advice!
Charlotte

 

[1muttsfan]

It would make it hard to retrieve birds or eggs from under the coop if that became nescessary. I would cut the legs off and build a square frame of pressure-treated 4x4's resting on a gravel pad for it to sit on.

 

[PapaChaz]

why not attach the run to the coop somehow and have the pop doors open into the run?

I have learned in the past, wire off the area under the coop, sounds like a great idea to have it available to them for extra run space, shade etc etc.........BUT if you don't leave easy enough access under there, it's nearly impossible to clean or collect the occasional egg that WILL be laid under there

how tall are the 'stilts'? if you cut them down so it's only a foot or so above ground level you're better off yes.

how tall is the coop not counting the stilts?

 

[1muttsfan]

why not attach the run to the coop somehow and have the pop doors open into the run?

That would work too