Nest Box Preferences? Floor vs Raised / Interior vs Exterior

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My Cornish X do lay eggs. They lay BIG eggs. They do not sleep in the boxes. They sleep on the ground on hay. You are right as far as the breed seldom lives past "chickhood" but I have a VERY enlightening story to tell you. Pull up a chair..........

About 4 years ago, a relative came to my house and had "6 white" chickens. He had been wanting me to have "white chickens" for a long time. He knew nothing about chickens (obviously) because the "white chickens" that he bought for me were Cornish X. When I saw the chickens, I knew they looked "different". I asked him what breed of chicken it was and he said that he didn't know. He just said that the man at the feed store told him the white chickens were "good" chickens to have, so he bought 6 of them for me. After a few days, I started watching the chickens closely and realized that the "white" chickens were Cornish X. I was like, "Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo". I knew that the Cornish X would not live long because of the breed. Well, I immediately began research on the Cornish X as far as their life expectancy. I knew that I couldn't cull them for the meat, so trying to pro-long their life was my only option. Now most people would argue and be upset with me as far as trying to prolong the life of a meat bird that is specifically bred to provide meat and I do understand their point but at the time that I received the chickens, I just couldn't bring myself to cull the birds for meat. Anyway, I researched day and night and I found a few articles and also found very few people who have successfully raised meat birds past the age of 6 - 8 weeks and I read their story. Well after reading their stories, I knew what I had to do. Throughout my reading (and using common sense), I learned the following in order to keep my girls living beyond the age of 8 weeks:

1. Do not overfeed.
2. Let them free range daily or as often as possible to eat bugs, etc.
3. Limit snacks
4. Provide exercise (place feed and throw snacks away from the bird, so that they can walk to the feed or snack to get exercise)
5. Place nesting boxes & comfortable bedding (sleep area) on the ground so that they do not try to jump into the nesting box to lay an egg and possibly break a leg.
6. Do not place them with roosters. The rooster will try to breed, which places too much weight on the bird and can break their leg.

All of this sounds like a lot in order to prolong the life of a bird (that is bred to eat at just weeks old) but once you do it every day, it's a peice of cake. Many people laughed at me and told me a Cornish living beyond a few months was impossible and it couldn't be done and that it was unfair to the bird to live such a terrible live being overweight and will all sorts of medical problems. Guess what? The pic below speaks for itself. Who has the last laugh now?
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I love it when people tell me that I can't do something. The proof is in the chicken not the pudding.
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This is a pic of my girls at about 3 years old, after having a dust bath. They are now 4 years old.
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If you're only going to have 18 hens, you only need like 4-6 nestboxes max, which for most people would fit neatly into a single row on the wall. Access for the chickens is easier when it's a single row. OTOH you can certainly do the other arrangement if you want, there's nothing really *wrong* with it.

2) The bottom box at floor height or raised ~18 inches?

Raised, if at all possible (and in your coop I see no reason why it wouldn't be), so that they can walk around and use the floorspace underneath the boxes. Even in a decent-sized coop, that still matters.

3) Interior or exterior boxes, ie the ones built to "hang" outside the coop wall?

Interior, by all means!!!! If you want outside acccess, build a hatch int he wall, as you suggest, but build the boxes INSIDE. It is far, far easier to engineer, and exterior boxes are a chronic weakness in terms of weatherproofing and predatorproofing.

The ONLY reason in my opinion to EVER have exterior boxes is if the coop is teeny tiny and there simply is not physical room for indoor nestboxes.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat​

Im glad you answered #3 the way you did. I have one wall left and it will be the one with the nest boxes and I was having difficulty deciding and engineering teh exterior ones...So interior it is...​
 
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Just wanna add that your broody nests should be floor level for entry/exit for the chicks. All of my nest boxes are individual and movable so I can move a broody, nest and all, to the maternity pens, but that won`t usually work with outside access. Think a lot and have few regrets.......Pop

I was going to build the basic frame then put an economy cat litter box in the bottom of each to hold nesting materials. They're usually 12"x14"x4" and I can get them for $2-3 each. Figured that would make them easy to move and clean!"
 
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Just wanna add that your broody nests should be floor level for entry/exit for the chicks. All of my nest boxes are individual and movable so I can move a broody, nest and all, to the maternity pens, but that won`t usually work with outside access. Think a lot and have few regrets.......Pop

I was going to build the basic frame then put an economy cat litter box in the bottom of each to hold nesting materials. They're usually 12"x14"x4" and I can get them for $2-3 each. Figured that would make them easy to move and clean!"

Great idea- totally stealing this. I have two chickens sleeping in the nest boxes and its a mess. With this I can toss and refill with clean bedding.
THANKS!
 
Wal-Mart also has organizer bins (their store brand) that happen to be 11.5"x14.5"x5" for $2.50 ea. They're nicely straight-sided so I was able to fit 4 in a row in a 4' space.
 
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I was going to build the basic frame then put an economy cat litter box in the bottom of each to hold nesting materials. They're usually 12"x14"x4" and I can get them for $2-3 each. Figured that would make them easy to move and clean!"

Great idea- totally stealing this. I have two chickens sleeping in the nest boxes and its a mess. With this I can toss and refill with clean bedding.
THANKS!

I can't take the credit, I think I saw a pic of something similar on here, where someone was using wash basins. My brain just went to kitty litter pans since we had a stray cat living under our house for a while (thankfully he used a litter box!) so I have a few spares lying around. We were finally able to coax him out with some tuna and send him on his way. But I'm hoping in addition to making them a snap to clean, it will help prevent mites since there's no corners to hide in.
 
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My Cornish X do lay eggs. They lay BIG eggs. They do not sleep in the boxes. They sleep on the ground on hay. You are right as far as the breed seldom lives past "chickhood" but I have a VERY enlightening story to tell you. Pull up a chair..........

What a great story. I am getting my first Cornish this year and while they are destined for freezer camp (my first time...and maybe my last) I was thinking about keeping some hens to see what would happen. The problem for me would be that my flock does have some roosters, but at least the majority of those are banties. My birds do free range, and these chicks will too, once they are out of the brooder. Maybe I will keep some, it would be fun to try, I am also one of those, never tell me "no" people. I am sharing these birds with a friend and she wants free range meaties, says they taste better, so our the door they will go.

Thank you for sharing. Your hens look wonderfully happy.
 
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Great idea- totally stealing this. I have two chickens sleeping in the nest boxes and its a mess. With this I can toss and refill with clean bedding.
THANKS!

I can't take the credit, I think I saw a pic of something similar on here, where someone was using wash basins. My brain just went to kitty litter pans since we had a stray cat living under our house for a while (thankfully he used a litter box!) so I have a few spares lying around. We were finally able to coax him out with some tuna and send him on his way. But I'm hoping in addition to making them a snap to clean, it will help prevent mites since there's no corners to hide in.

I use cat litter boxes inside my wooden nest boxes and it does make then quite easy to clean. They are really cheap so I have more than I need and I just swap them out with fresh ones, clean the old ones if they are really gross, and let them air dry. I have chickens that like to sleep in the boxes as well so they can get quite dirty. We are in the process of building a 10x14 coop so all of this will be re-done, hopefully in the next few months. The boxes are going down lower, new roosts, and a brooding/maternity ward with limited outside access. I am really exicted.

Of course the weather was great where I live for about 6 weeks. Now that I have the materials and the time it is raining again. I have 50 meat birds and 15 layers showing up on March 11 so it better be ready or my house will be quite crowded. I have no garage. YIKES.

I am always looking for ideas on BYC. Roll out nest boxes, self feeders, and automatic pop doors are on the want list. Good thing DH is quite handy and tolerant of my crazy ideas.
 
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What height are your current nest boxes and why are you lowering them? Just trying to finalize my next box setup, so collecting all the info I can!
 

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