I've Had It With The "Triangle" Coop!

[Chickie Mamma]

Ruth--- VERY nice... Thats more my idea now. Our run is attached to the house, then we have a large pen that they go in on nice days. (covered in ice now). We are going to cut off the attached run and keep the house and make a pen like yours. Thanks for being so helpful and sharing your coop! There are so many nice ideas out there. Our henhouse opens fully from the back, so thats fine. But we will work on the pen. Do you have predators? We have alot of foxes here. We needed something that we can put chicken wire underneath. Lost 8 birds in May, dug 2 feet under a rock wall we had surrounding the coop. Thanks again!!

 

[ruth]

If you make it raised, use welded wire/hardware cloth for the floor that way something can't rip through it like they can chicken wire. Also if you have predators you should also use the welded wire for the run but can use the larger hole like livestock fencing and just put chicken wire or small hole hardware cloth around the bottom to keep babies in. We had all sorts of predators but our chickens were free rangers there and are here as well. We have Rex, our German Shepherd who wouldn't let anything come in our yard. The chickens freeranged all day and only returned to the coop at night so they didn't need much room in the coop. But they did have the large run for days that I didn't let them out for some reason. The run there was chicken wire but our runs here in the country are livestock fencing.

 

[seminolewind]

Quote:

I did that this morning!!!!

Is everything frozen in there for you too?? The snow melted that was in there only to make a sheet of ice. I saw someone made chicken saddles, do they make little ice skates too??

No, it's quite warm in Florida, and the poop is nice and soft and mushy

 

[Chickie Mamma]

I will look into welded wire. I doubled up the chicken wire on the run and I have an electric wire running along the perimeter. Our dogs do not help! My husky killed 2 of our babies last year. So forget them for protection! Thanks for the tips! I have a pretty good sketch here, now just to get DH to approve!! He likes making things so it shouldn't be a problem.. I will show him your layout when he gets home from work. Thanks again for your help!!

 

[Chickie Mamma]

Quote:

I did that this morning!!!!

Is everything frozen in there for you too?? The snow melted that was in there only to make a sheet of ice. I saw someone made chicken saddles, do they make little ice skates too??

No, it's quite warm in Florida, and the poop is nice and soft and mushy

LUCKY YOU !!

 

[seminolewind]

Quote:
No, it's quite warm in Florida, and the poop is nice and soft and mushy

LUCKY YOU !!

I always keep baby wipes in the coop-gets me thru till I get to real soap and water, LOL

 

[cajunlizz]

Quote:
I agree .... When we 1st. built our run with attached Coop , we had NO idea that we's get so attached and addicted . NOW we have 3 runs and 2 coops all with overhead covering and perimeter has buried wire 1 ft. deep .

I told DH to build it bigger the 1st. Merry Go Round , NOW he wishes he had . 1st. coop is 8x12 and run is 12 x32 ... nd. coop is 8x8 and run is 12 x32 and back run is 12x20

Wow those are some big runs! What are they made from and how high?

The runs are a full 8 ft. tall and the post are with treated land scape timbers .

 

[Chickie Mamma]

Thanks Liz... 8 ft tall sounds real roomy! Thanks for the tips!!

 

[cajunlizz]

YVW

 

[6mutts]

I had the EXACT SAME problem. Hubby and I build a cute little red a fram coop/tractor. UNTIL I realized the run on the bottom was a huge pain in my butt--litterally, b/c I got horrible charlie horse cramps whenever i had to get in there, and of course i only had an opening at one end and the hens laid eggs in the FAR end.....figures.....And then the neighbors dog kept ripping off the chicken wire and killed two flocks. But hubby said absolutely he was not building another coop until this one fell to the ground hahaha! So instead I took the chicken wire off and just surrounded the coop with a fence that extended about 8 ft out from the coop---works soooo good now. Now the only problem is when i'm trying to clean it out on a windy day---the door slam on my head!