New Amish coop arrived, modifications / considerations?

[3KillerBs]

Welcome to BYC. Where, in general, are you? Climate matters.

Unfortunately, I have limited internet access right now. But here's some quick general information:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/hot-climate-chicken-housing-and-care.77263/
https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/cold-weather-poultry-housing-and-care.72010/

The Usual Guidelines

For each adult, standard-sized hen you need:

• 4 square feet in the coop (.37 square meters)
• 10 square feet in the run (.93 square meters),
• 1 linear foot of roost (.3 meters),
• 1/4 of a nest box,
• And 1 square foot (.09 square meters) of permanent, 24/7/365 ventilation, preferably located over the birds' heads when they're sitting on the roost.

20 hens

• 80 square feet in the coop. 8'x10' is the most practical because 7'x12' or 6'x14' require a lot of weird cuts.
• 20 feet of roost
• 200 square feet in the run. 10'x20', 12'x16' or 8'x25' as suits the land available.
• 20 square feet of ventilation.
• 5 nest boxes.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/how-much-room-do-chickens-need.66180/

Sorry, this is all disjointed but I'm in the breakroom after clocking out at work and my ride has just arrived.

 

[mowin]

The guy I got it from told me that was structural, but it seems really odd to me - I fully agree that they'd be tempting roost spots, but very tall.

Honestly I was just going to hang a few rows of 2x2's from those, I think it would look really cool and I can still sweep the floors because they'll be suspended from the beams above.

To make a loft space? You'd need to keep it blocked off to keep the gals out of there, also if you did end up opening up the eves for ventilation, you wouldn't want to block that off with a loft.

 

[EstorilM]

Also, those boards up top are going to be tempting roost boards, if they can stair hop or fly up there. Is that spot for storage?

 

[EstorilM]

What state are you in? I’ve been looking at coops but they are all ’sell a kidney’ expensive. I’m in Indiana - if you are nearby, can you share the contact info of the guy who made it? Thanks!

Yup I'll shoot you a PM when I'm out of work, I think hes going to bump up prices a bit, but they should still be nearly half off the big companies.

 

[rosemarythyme]

What's your general location/climate?

As a rough estimate I'd say this holds 12 birds, as long as that 6x8 measurement does not include nest boxes.

Guess this design is just super popular as we see variations on it all the time. Yes you'll need more ventilation, though amount recommended will once again depend on your climate. Best general suggestion is to open up the under eaves between the roof beams, like so: https://www.backyardchickens.com/th...bout-ventilation.1503494/page-3#post-25174867 however if you're in a very hot climate, you may need to think about opening up an entire wall for ventilation.

I agree that those beams across the top might be tempting as roosting spots. Might want to consider netting or chicken wire to keep the birds out of that area?

 

[microchick]

Beautiful coop.

You have been given great advice. The only thing I would add is that be prepared. Wood is no deterrent to rodents. I speak from experience when I say they will gnaw through whatever separates them from a free meal even if it means chewing through 2X4s to get to it.

They will also tunnel under the coop. Rats are particularly good at that. I can't tell from the pictures but you might want to consider putting down hardware cloth under your coop and installing a 'skirt' of hardware cloth around the outside, digging down a foot around the coop to insure that nothing can dig under it or chew through at ground level.

I've had rats and mice both chew through 2X4s, paneling and framework to get access to the interior of my converted shed coop.

Also, have you considered pouring a concrete slab to set your coop on? That would eliminate critters getting under and setting up housekeeping in the gap between the coop and the ground.

We live in the middle of an Amish community so I know how much you have invested in your coop. Plus I've been fighting rodents for 7 years now so I know how tenacious
they can be.

Welcome to backyard chickens and the wonderful and challenging world of keeping poultry.

 

[JHH3]

I’m really happy with it, but what would you suggest for additional perches and roosts? I have no issue with woodwork… have built and modified coops in the past, but you all bring a LOT of new ideas and features I hadn’t thought of.

I have 25 chicks that I’m raising, 10 are straight-run (Golden laced wyandottes) and I’ll likely give 4x of the roosters away, so I’ll be around 20. In my experience I don’t think that’s too many, but based on the math everyone quotes here, it seems like Thats too much?

I just finished installing the run posts and backfilling with cement, we have a TON of predators out here and I’m trying to make this thing bulletproof (I’ll do another post about the run though).

Nice looking coop, I have a similar style coop, not quite as nice as yours (yours looks to be built much better quality) but larger at 8x10. In retrospect I'm not sure I'd have gotten that style knowing what I know now.

Despite the roof overhang, I found that water would get into the nesting boxes through the cracks where the lids were hinged. So keep an eye on that, you might need to adjust later, I ended up putting flexible rubber over the hinges to try. I get a lot of blowing rain as well as snow, also didn't help that the lids warped over time despite being 2 inches thick, so you may not have an issue.

Can't tell from your pictures but if the chickens small door opens downwards and is also used as their ramp, I'd suggest changing that. All sorts of goop gets into the hinge area making it hard to close. Mine was like that and I ultimately moved the hinges so it'd open sideways, still not happy with it and hope to replace it with a vertical sliding door.

I can guarantee you that your birds are going to roost up high inside if they can fly themselves up there and they fit. They'll use lower bars to get up to the high ones. I've had smaller birds roost up in the eaves because they are higher and they were able to make the flight and squeeze in there.

I covered my windows on the outside with hardware cloth, just to be safe and make it harder for critters to get in. Not going to stop the persistent and strong predator, but will slow them down.

As others have said, you'll probably want more ventilation than just the windows, you probably won't want to leave them open all the time. Learn about coop ventilation and make your own decisions based on how your coop is built, it's easy for us to say do this or do that but you ultimately know what it's like there in regards to weather, wind and your particular chickens behavior (where they roost).

On a side note, I've got gold laced wyandottes, about 2 years old now. They have "interesting" personalities.

I think you'll probably be fine with the number of chickens you have as long as they don't stay cooped up in the coop for longer than overnight, if they're going to stay closed up inside a lot for whatever reason then it may not be big enough. Looks like the run is going to be decent sized, so I think you'll be ok.