New Member Building a Coop

[Zbee167]

Hello everyone! I'm new to raising chickens. They will be shipped out to me on April 29, 2020. I'm getting 10 pullets and 2 roosters. My brothers will be building my coop for me in my backyard tomorrow morning. I have experience raising quail and rabbits, but, this is a first for the chickens. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. They're building my coop from wood and hardware cloth. I live in South Florida, so, it gets SUPER HOT here! I was thinking about using dried fallen leaves as their bedding inside of the coop. Is this a good idea??? Any recommendations on coop designs??? I know this is last minute, but, I just found this group. Thanks in advance...

 

[rosemarythyme]

Ventilation, lots and lots of it. An open air design might suit your climate the best.

I tried dried leaves as bedding before and it was too hard to manage. Great for composting if that's your aim, but if you actually want to scoop up poop off of it, doesn't work so well.

 

[Kgbao]

Welcome from Georgia, the Poultry capital of the world (2018).. Glad you have joined this chicken crazy board.

Here is a quick link to the articles area, lots of info on this forum, just look around. Also if you have a specific question the search engine (top right) is actually very good..

https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/categories/learning-center.11/

I see Rose covered ventilation, one idea is build in a box fan to pull air through the coop (blowing out not it), this will let your vent holes draw a lot more air, and allow for a better draft to keep the baby’s cooler.

 

[Zbee167]

Welcome from Georgia, the Poultry capital of the world (2018).. Glad you have joined this chicken crazy board.

Here is a quick link to the articles area, lots of info on this forum, just look around. Also if you have a specific question the search engine (top right) is actually very good..

https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/categories/learning-center.11/

I see Rose covered ventilation, one idea is build in a box fan to pull air through the coop (blowing out not it), this will let your vent holes draw a lot more air, and allow for a better draft to keep the baby’s cooler.

Thank you!

 

[Zbee167]

Ventilation, lots and lots of it. An open air design might suit your climate the best.

I tried dried leaves as bedding before and it was too hard to manage. Great for composting if that's your aim, but if you actually want to scoop up poop off of it, doesn't work so well.

Thanks for this insight!

 

[rosemarythyme]

Thanks for this insight!

Oh I do want to add, you should still consider saving up dried leaves, even if not as coop bedding. Chickens love digging through dried leaves, so tossing a pile of them in the run/free range area every so often keeps them pretty busy for a day or two.

 

[Zbee167]

Ventilation, lots and lots of it. An open air design might suit your climate the best.

I tried dried leaves as bedding before and it was too hard to manage. Great for composting if that's your aim, but if you actually want to scoop up poop off of it, doesn't work so well.

I was thinking about using the leaves as bedding to accomplish a deep liter system.

 

[Zbee167]

Oh I do want to add, you should still consider saving up dried leaves, even if not as coop bedding. Chickens love digging through dried leaves, so tossing a pile of them in the run/free range area every so often keeps them pretty busy for a day or two.

Thank you!

 

[rosemarythyme]

I was thinking about using the leaves as bedding to accomplish a deep liter system.

Doing a true (or even semi) deep litter inside most coops is pretty difficult due to the fact that it does best with a dirt floor and moisture. Coops do better with deep bedding, which stays dry. Deep litter type systems are better in a run.

 

[Zbee167]

Doing a true (or even semi) deep litter inside most coops is pretty difficult due to the fact that it does best with a dirt floor and moisture. Coops do better with deep bedding, which stays dry. Deep litter type systems are better in a run.

Thank you! I will have a dirt floor.