Need help designing an irregular-shaped covered run

[K0k0shka]

Does it have property deeds? Your purchase should be listed under Grantee

I found it! Turns out the search results had multiple pages, but there's no indication of that on the page. Just a "next" and "previous" button but no page numbers at all, so I thought it only had those three entries from way back. But when I clicked next, it took me to more pages and I eventually found the deed with our names on it. Wohoo! Thanks for the help!

The website says that the registry of deeds only has "plans of land" (without the buildings), not "mortgage surveys" though. Not sure if that would be good enough for my purposes, but I'll ask the inspector when he calls.

 

[HenOnAJuneBug]

I found it! Turns out the search results had multiple pages, but there's no indication of that on the page. Just a "next" and "previous" button but no page numbers at all, so I thought it only had those three entries from way back. But when I clicked next, it took me to more pages and I eventually found the deed with our names on it. Wohoo! Thanks for the help!

The website says that the registry of deeds only has "plans of land" (without the buildings), not "mortgage surveys" though. Not sure if that would be good enough for my purposes, but I'll ask the inspector when he calls.

There should be on your deed either a verbal description of your lot boundaries, or a reference to a plot map, or maybe more likely a subdivision plot map.

 

[HenOnAJuneBug]

There should be on your deed either a verbal description of your lot boundaries, or a reference to a plot map, or maybe more likely a subdivision plot map.

Sometimes those are listed as Appendixes

 

[K0k0shka]

There should be on your deed either a verbal description of your lot boundaries, or a reference to a plot map, or maybe more likely a subdivision plot map.

Says I need to log in to buy and print the deed, but I can't find how to register or what login information it's asking for... I have a physical copy of the deed somewhere though, if it's the same thing I might as well go look for it. I thought there might have been something else the registry had in addition to that.

 

[K0k0shka]

It’s been a tense day waiting for that call, which hasn’t come yet. Oh well, I doubt my coop clusterf*** is high on the inspector’s priority list.

Meanwhile I’m keeping hope alive and working on my run plans. I haven’t given up on the irregular shape yet. I really don’t want to lose that space. Plus, I like a good challenge I measured the fence panels again and updated the sketch with the wooden supports and all the measurements accounted for. The north wall will be all the same height, about 5.5’ (plus top plate), from the coop out to the big tree. That will make it easier. The wall sizes are dictated by the panel dimensions. The angled wall will be HC. I think this could work! I’ll make a scale model out of some balsa wood I have left over from a crafts project. So I can visualize the angled section better, and also, because scale models are fun!

I went out and stretched some string along the run perimeter, but it’s hard to see in the photo so I drew on top of it after:

 

[aart]

Meanwhile I’m keeping hope alive and working on my run plans. I haven’t given up on the irregular shape yet. I really don’t want to lose that space.

Could go more like this, or something in between this and what @DobieLover drew:

 

[K0k0shka]

Could go more like this, or something in between this and what @DobieLover drew:
View attachment 2032507

I thought about doing that, too, but it doesn’t give me a lot of room to turn that corner if I’m trying to get through with the wheelbarrow to get to the compost pile. The corner of the run would be too close to the garden (which is 2 feet tall and made of cinder blocks). I need to see if my placement of the garden is correct here, actually. I think it extends a bit farther to the left.

 

[julskinka]

Now that my coop is almost done, I'm starting to plan out the run. I'm creating a separate thread for the run so it doesn't get lost in the coop build thread (which you can see here).

I've been designing and redesigning this since last summer. The space I have is an irregular shape, which makes this tricky. There are trees and bushes in the way, and a raised garden bed. I want to give the chickens the maximum area I can though, and an irregular run is the only way to do that.

This will probably be long and I'll have lots of questions, so bear with me, I need to think this through. I appreciate any feedback!

So, here are my latest plans (standard map orientation, so the top is north):
View attachment 2026597

The run needs to go around the little tree that's next to the coop. That's a linden tree so it will get big, and I want to leave it enough room (it's very young right now). The whole area will have a sloped roof, sloping south to north, so towards the property line. The 3'x5' section of the run that's attached to the coop will have a lower roof - about 5' tall, just enough for me to walk under - to leave room for the linden tree's branches. The main section, the 11'x11', will be taller, sloping down from 8' in the front to about 5.5' in the back. I'm treating the 3'x5' and the 11'x11' sections as two structures with two separate roofs, just to get two regular shapes that are easier to work with, and then I'll have to connect them somehow (more drawings and questions on that later).

The original soil on our property was heavily contaminated with lead, so we had everything covered with several inches of clean fill after we moved in. So the surface is fine, but I don't want to dig. Which means no footing holes for the run structure. I want to lay down landscape timbers along the whole perimeter and use them as the bottom of the run frame. So the vertical supports attach to the landscape timbers at the bottom. Would that work? Any advice, best practices or red flags?

The fencing material will be wrought iron mesh panels, which I got for free from a former chicken owner neighbor. They are about 3'x4' and I have 28 of them, enough to cover the whole run (with some HC patching for the irregular-shaped areas). The mesh holes are 2"x2". A bit big, but that's what I have. The coop door will be closed at night, and our worst enemies here are large, so I hope that's enough. I'll also have a denser HC apron along the ground and going up a foot or two along the fence. The panels look like this:
View attachment 2026600

The walls: the iron panels will stack on top of each other, two tall, standing on their short sides for the taller south wall (so 8 feet tall total), and on their short sides for the north wall, so a little under 6 feet tall. They are solid and very heavy. If the horizontal top beam of the run frame is resting on the top edges of the iron panels, can I count on them for support and use 2x4's for both the vertical supports and the top horizontal supports of the run frame? Or will I still need 4x4's? Or a combination of the two? How far apart should the vertical supports be?

The roof will be partially covered year-round, with clear polycarbonate panels, so the chickens always have a dry outside area. The rest will have a welded wire mesh on top for protection (probably 2"x4" for cost purposes). I will only cover that part with polycarbonate in the winter, to keep the snow out of the run. The reason for that is because I have trees and shrubs either inside or immediately next to the run, and don't want to cut off their water supply during the growing season. I also want some rain water to get in there for the sake of composting the organic matter on the floor somewhat. The clear panels will allow light to still go through. The tree marked "HUGE TREE" on the right is a giant maple that shades everything, so I don't need additional shade, but rather, more light. As for snow load, I don't really know what to plan for anymore. This used to be snow country, but snow is actually rare nowadays. Every few years we'll get a giant snowstorm with deep snow, but most years there's barely enough for a snowman.

Now, questions about the roof:
▪ Will 2x6's be enough for the roof rafters? Will the fact that the roof will be resting on the iron panels all the way along the south and the north wall help distribute the load?
▪ If the rafters are 11+ feet long, will I need additional vertical supports somewhere in the middle of the run? Or will the rafters be enough?
▪ How far apart should the rafters be?
▪ The polycarbonate panels are only 2' wide, so I assume I'll need purlins as well, unless the rafters are 2' apart (which seems excessive to me...but maybe not?) What size wood do I need for the purlins? Will wall studs be enough? (1x2 or 1x3)
▪ How much of the roof can I get away with covering permanently without killing the bush inside the run and negatively affecting the linden tree? (the bush is a forsythia, so it's hardy, and rainwater will run off the roof and down directly behind the bush and hopefully water it, but still).

Thank you to whoever survived until the end of this giant post, and thank you for any feedback!

I have a similar set up - an irregular 400 sq feet that extend past my rectangular covered run and surround an apple tree. I covered it by criss-crossing nylon string (including through the tree branches) at high tension, then making a spiral spider web design, then covering it all with bird netting. It was a little awkward to get around the tree, but it successfully rebuffed a hawk last week, so it works.

 

[julskinka]

I have a similar set up - an irregular 400 sq feet that extend past my rectangular covered run and surround an apple tree. I covered it by criss-crossing nylon string (including through the tree branches) at high tension, then making a spiral spider web design, then covering it all with bird netting. It was a little awkward to get around the tree, but it successfully rebuffed a hawk last week, so it works.

 

[anno1]

Hi, I built my own run at my last house, and it was an odd shape. We sank the posts. I'm not a carpenter and can't tell you what would be the best way to anchor the run and posts if you don't want to sink the posts, but that seems like a problem.

Also, chickens scratch up an amazing amount of dirt. Mine are constantly digging up more rocks, even though I had mostly de-rocked the run initially. It looks to me like they've dug down a couple of inches in the run I just created last yea. (Not sure where the dirt went, but I'm assuming they ate a decent amount of it and kicked some out of the run.) It sounds like you already have the dirt in there, but you could put hardware cloth down and put more dirt on top to limit how far down the chickens can scratch. I put hardware cloth down 6" below grade on my last coop and filled back in, just to keep predators out.

I used a 1/2"x1" vinyl coated steel fencing, and moved to a 1"x2" fencing as it got farther up.
I attached it as much as possible directly to the coop, but used chicken wire here and there to cover the spots that were tough to get the fencing into. I put a corrugated fiberglass rough on 2x4 rafters on the roof. I had it sloping, as you plan to, and put a gutter and rain barrel on the low end, which worked well. I would put the low end of the roof on the low side of the slope--if there is one. I didn't do that on my first run, and excess water overflowed the gutter into the coop. Better to have the water fall off on the low side of the slope and continue it's run away from the coop.

I agree that having a roof that doesn't slope would be easier, but I think it's good to have rain runoff, and I wanted a rain barrel and it seemed a good place to put it. I didn't have much trouble figuring out the slope. Frankly, decided that one side of the run would be 7' and one would be 5', and laid the 2x4s on top of the 2x4s on either side. The only tough part was figuring out the slope of the fencing.

I was working with the fencing that was maybe 3' or 4' high, and I just cut it as necessary so that it fit the slope as much as possible. Used some odd pieces in that area. It wasn't perfect, and I doubt anyone would have mistaken it for a professional job, but it worked fine. again, filled in with vinyl coated chicken wire anywhere there was a gap. I had 2x4s horizontally around about 3 or so feet high, (as high as the fencing I used on the lower part of the coop) so I had something to attach the fencing to where it met.

I also put 2' of hardware cloth horizontally on the ground outside the coop and run, and a foot wide layer of rocks on top of that (so there was the run fencing, then hardware cloth 2' horizontally on the ground going out from the run, and rock on the first foot of HC next to the run fencing. The HC is ziptied to the run fencing. These are to befuddle predators. They start digging beyond the rock, but there's still HC there to keep them from digging. I saw a fox snooping round my run a few months ago, but he was unable to get in (so far!) so it seems to work pretty well.

Zipties and fencing washers work wonders!