Looking for your turkey tractor...

[DVTO2]

Looks like you split your own boards for the coop - very nice!

 

[vtgirls]

Thanks so much - we actually bought them just down the way from a local sawmill. Very inexpensive yet great environmentally and good looking too. We are taking the back off the coop (thats the side you see in the picture) and adding another structure about 8x10 to it - the roof will be offset as will the footprint for the building. When its done it will have a little cottage look about it. The new roof will be 6 ft at its top and 4 at its lowest edge - I will be fine (at 5' tall) to go in and clean up! I am beginning the floor/walls in the garage and as soon as the ground thaws we will be putting it together... Must say I appreciate the DH - he built it with me this fall and then I ordered way more chicks than could fit (and had a broody mama hatch a few) so he is going to help out with the new construction on the new coop! Need more room for more chickens ;-)

 

[A.T. Hagan]

Quote:
I don't have a clear shot of the roosts in my tractors, but here's one that show them enough to give you an idea.

This one is in my turkey tractor so the spacing is wider to allow for bigger birds, but other than that it's the way they are all done.

They're made of pressure treated 2x2s. Joins are made with three inch screws made for use with treated wood. At the high ends where they tie to the cattle panels I did them similar to the way I tied in the 1x4 framing in the photo above. Drill a hole all the way through the sides of the 2x2 about an inch or so from the end. Run fourteen gauge wire through each hole twice then wrap around the panel as above.

The hangers are made of fourteen gauge wire as well twisted around each other then wrapped around the bottom of the roosts. They're eight feet wide so a hanger on each end and one in the middle. The same with the top end anchors. Three points.

When you're making the hangers you want to make sure to get the lengths even so that the roosts will hang right when all of the birds are on them. There is some side to side swing which could eliminate by anchoring that way, but it doesn't seem to bother the birds so I did not.