Input on coop dimensions please! Ordinance says 30sq ft coop & 50sq ft run

[jbher]

Here's a picture of the area (ignore the fence panels in the yard - my husband shortened the garden fence to make more room for the chickens)

 

[Ridgerunner]

With 5 hens a 48” long roost is long enough. Longer is better but 4’ is OK. In Minnesota I’m assuming you will feed and water inside, so make sure you have room for feeder and waterer where they can’t poop in it from the roost. Or consider a droppings board under the roost and over the feed and/or water. Design your interior layout (roosts, feeder, waterer, windows, doors, nest openings) before you build anything.

I’d have a roof that was only one slope and pretty steep so the snow slides off away from the door and run. That also keeps rainwater from running off your roof into the run. If you try to build a fancy roof with peaks and valleys, you have increased risk of leaks plus it is harder to build. Snow might stick up there too so design for snow load. Keep it as simple as you can and drain the rainwater away from your run.

Put the run on the side where the building will block most blowing snow if you have a prevalent wind direction.

Make it tall enough so you don’t bump your head in the coop or run.

 

[chickengeorgeto]

Buy your lumber in 10 foot, 12 foot, and 14 foot lengths.

Before doing so make sure that every board is square and even on both ends and that if not be sure that it is a fraction of an inch longer so that both ends can be squared up at an even 120 inches, 144 inches, and 168 inches.

Buying from a real lumber yard where they quote prices in board feet and not a big box retailer were a 16 foot board lets say costs 3 times, not twice more than an eight foot board cost will save you mega bucks.

By using the 5 foot, 6 foot and 7 foot coop and run plan you will only need to cut each 10, 12 & 14 foot board into two equal parts.

No extra cutting and no waste except for the saw dust that comes out of each saw cut or kerf.

Buy one 4X6 landscape timber and use the narrow (4 inch) curved section for the roost. You can even rip the landscape timber and get 2 eight foot roost or 4 four foot roosts.

There is nothing in the regs that should keep you from having an overhang so you should think of using boards longer than the walls so you have good drainage and less blow water.

If you wish to hen incubate chicks DON'T, I repeat, DO NOT build fixed nests into the pen or coop design. Instead spread a few nest boxes on the floor of the coop or run and that way you can pickup the broody hen, eggs, nest box and all at in the dead of night, and move the whole shebang into a small garage or basement pen for the 21 days or 3 weeks it takes a hen to become a mother and there is very little chance that she'll abandon the nest because of a gross disturbance.

Good luck and don't hit the wrong nail.

 

[Bear Foot Farm]

Quote: Dimensional lumber is always long enough to CUT a piece the nominal length

"Studs" are the only pieces that are reliably cut to a specified length

It IS a good idea to plan your cuts and leftover dimensions in advance so as to avoid having worthless scrap rather than usable boards

 

[chfite]

I wonder where the planners of ordinances get some of their numbers. They probably get them from the restrictions on dog houses.

I would make the coop as large a possible, all the way to the 30 square feet. 4 feet by 7.5 feet would require the least cutting.

This site has free plans that might help in your decision. http://poultry.purinamills.com/NUTRITIONMANAGEMENT/HenHouseHutchDesign/

Including the coop as part of the wall of the run will give you the most bang for your buck. Make the front of the coop part of the wall and the coop won't take up any of the space allowed for the run.

A square run will take less fencing, as mentioned above.

Chris

 

[res]

The photos are the "hidden" coop I built into a garden shed. The shed was still a shed and was used as my tack room, but the chickens "coop" was located under the workbench. We custom built the workbench to be 3' deep and it ran the length of the 10' shed wall. So it was 30sf... And was oh-so-easy to build....

Just throwing that out there as an option vs. the construction of a free-standing coop. That is if you are allowed to have a backyard shed. Kill 2 birds with one stone, ya know...

 

[jbher]

You guys are so awesome!! I am going to make a couple new sketchup plans today and post them to this thread get input.

Oh and get this - in our city a tool shed in the backyard can be 12 feet HIGH and all they say is that if it's over 140 square feet you have to get a building permit. Even better - during one of the last council meetings about the chicken ordinance the reason they were stating originally the coop can't be taller than 6' 6" is because residential fences can be 6' high and that way people don't have to see coops! They were trying to say that people would have to get privacy fences so coops won't be SEEN!! Yet anyone can have a mammoth ugly shed! SO CRAZY!!

I can't wait to move out to the country - only 2 more years... sigh... then I can have all the darn chickens I want and not worry about coop restrictions! Until then - on with my 30sq ft building haha

How much space should I devote to "storage" of feed and supplies? I could build a separate thing for storing feed, etc... not like a shed - but something that would fit a couple barrels and have a top that swings open? Or should I build storage into the coop??

 

[Bear Foot Farm]

Quote: One 30 gallon galvanized trash can will hold 100-150 lbs of feed