kit options for chicken run?

[U_Stormcrow]

I know you have real concerns about your building skills and available tools, but you might want to look into "hoop coops". They are cheap, they are easy to construct, and require a minimum of tools. A hammer, a pair of decent pliers, and a hack saw at bare minimum.

The biggest problem most even not handy people have with them is getting the 16' panels home to start bending them into shape.

 

[DaisyG2317]

OP, i see you are in WA. I am as well. I had The Original Chicken Man down in Orting build new coop. If you are pressed for time or worried about building skills, he does a fantastic job.

 

[3KillerBs]

I've looked at some of the coop plans here on BYC. They look good, solid, and well constructed, but they look well beyond my handy skills (and tools), which is why I went with a prefab coop. According to some of the posts around here, the prefab was a bad idea all around, including that it will probably only last a year, but it's constructed better than I could build. Scary

As @U_Stormcrow said, a hoop coop is a minimal skill build.

 

[brad2048]

OP, i see you are in WA. I am as well. I had The Original Chicken Man down in Orting build new coop. If you are pressed for time or worried about building skills, he does a fantastic job.

I found some pictures of some of his other coops online. They look good.

Our immediate problem is the need for more run space. Reading through other threads here, I'm concerned that soon our flimsy prefab is not going to last very long. It has yet to go through a Pacific Northwest wet and windy winter. A higher-quality coop like the Original Chicken Man's with an attached run would be better than a cheap prefab, but would be back to square one.

My wife thought it would be fun to have chickens again Not

 

[DaisyG2317]

I found some pictures of some of his other coops online. They look good.

Our immediate problem is the need for more run space. Reading through other threads here, I'm concerned that soon our flimsy prefab is not going to last very long. It has yet to go through a Pacific Northwest wet and windy winter. A higher-quality coop like the Original Chicken Man's with an attached run would be better than a cheap prefab, but would be back to square one.

My wife thought it would be fun to have chickens again Not

Our Chicken Man coop went through the heavy snow last year AND a tree fell on it when we had a windstorm a couple months ago, absolutely unscathed.

 

[3KillerBs]

Our immediate problem is the need for more run space.

A hoop run is even easier than a hoop coop. It can even be made without a wooden frame by just fastening the wire to T-posts.

 

[Aunt Tat]

We have one of those prefab coops that has a run space that is too small for our four hens. The maker says it's big enough for eight, though it's only about six feet long. Huh?
View attachment 2825423

Anyway, we currently use a dog pen with a canopy cover that we move around to give the girls play time in the yard, but I'm thinking about getting a walk-in chicken kennel for daytime use, separate from this coop, which they can convert to a dirt area. This type of kennel "kit" comes with chicken wire, as you can see in the picture below, so not chain link or hardware cloth. I know this is not suitable for nighttime use, since we have raccoons as well as flying predators like hawks and falcons around here (suburb city north of Seattle). The one I'm looking at (on amazon) is the one below, it's 10' x 6' x 6', so 15 sq ft / hen for our four.
View attachment 2825428

There are sturdier options that I've seen in the forum threads here, but we don't get those predators like raccoons during the day, so I naively expect that it should be okay. The yard has a six foot wooden fence around it, so stray dogs are not a threat.

Does anyone have experience with this type of kennel?

It's a kit, so hopefully not a major project to assemble, but I've never worked with fencing. Is it simpler, and not much harder to assemble, to just buy the components?

Thank you

We have the exact same coop/run (in the process of painting it) I'm STILL trying to figure out if I can duck into the door through the kennel. We also got an extended run (3'x8'x4') but have to figure out how to attach it to the Farmhouse Coop.

We're thinking of doing a PVC/Wire portable run for them. But a kennel for the coop and run would be so much easier to access.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

We have the exact same coop/run (in the process of painting it) I'm STILL trying to figure out if I can duck into the door through the kennel. We also got an extended run (3'x8'x4') but have to figure out how to attach it to the Farmhouse Coop.

We're thinking of doing a PVC/Wire portable run for them. But a kennel for the coop and run would be so much easier to access.

IF you go with a PVC run, don't skimp. I made a small portable for exposing my hatchlings to the outside on good days with garden netting and 1/2" pvc. Though its small, just 4' x 6' x 4' high, there is still plenty of flex in it - enough that the PVC door I made using "T" pieces slipped over another pipe gets twisted up all the time (and works poorly, besides.

Also, the larger chickens tned to roost on the top edges. I ended up adding center supports on the "long" sides.