Old Ice Shed into a Hen Haven? ... Ideas, Opinions, etc.PICTURE HEAVY!

[Chick_a_dee]

LOL sure thing! Just watch out for the fishers when you go out at night! ... plus no A/C makes it rather warm with no windows open!


LOL actually, funny thing is it was originally going to be turned into a Bunkie for guests and the bed and bale thing we want to set up eventually, it overlooks the valley there and would be perfect with a small corral in the valley, because it has a driveway entrance, and parking at the top of the hill by the garage.

 

[coffeelady3]

You could start your own little bed and breakfast!

 

[patandchickens]

Quote:
On such an old structure, with foundation (not just slab) problems, I would suggest having a tradesman (like a mason or concrete guy) look at it to make sure that you fix it *right*, structurally speaking.

Yes, you can buy bottles of bonding agent at Rona or Home Depot or wherever, just ask for concrete bonding agent

, but patching concrete in a way that will last more than six months is not just a matter of goobering more on -- you generally have to cold-chisel out all the loose stuff back into good sound concrete and chisel in a 'key' and in some cases add rebar. Phone someone, honest. It is surprisingly not that difficult for d-i-y to make the problem worse.

How much space for our run would I need? Space is not limited so give me a number, that would include space to expand the flock.

As big as you can stand to build.

already has power to it... it just needs to be hooked up to the house power again, and it has a fuse box inside the door we're going to relocate to the other end where the bunker is, and it will be turned into a breaker panel not fuses

By an actual electrician who will also inspect and fix any exciting old 'features' of the wiring, yes?

how many ceiling lights should I have? currently there is one flourescent tube box up there, I wanted to put in a regular light fixture and use the caged outdoor lights from home depot as my ceiling light, and for lightbulb I was thinking of buying the compact flourescent daylight bulbs... would this be a good idea? or should I stick with the regular compact flourescents?

Don't use compact fluorescents... the ballasts work poorly in cold weather and not at all in REALLY cold weather, which of course is a nontrivial part of the year up here

Personally I would stick with the fluorescent, making sure that it had a cold-weather ballast. <shrug> If for some reason you have a thing against fluorescent lights, one 75-watt bulb should be sufficient or two (spaced equidistant on the ceiling) if you really like Bright Light or want a backup for if one of 'em blows.

would regular chicken wire be okay to make the partition wall?

Yes.

Beautiful old structure you got there, btw - will make a great coop

Have fun,

Pat​

 

[Rogue_Woman]

You lucky dog, I want to have an old building hanging around begging to be a coop

 

[Chick_a_dee]

Quote:
On such an old structure, with foundation (not just slab) problems, I would suggest having a tradesman (like a mason or concrete guy) look at it to make sure that you fix it *right*, structurally speaking.

Yes, you can buy bottles of bonding agent at Rona or Home Depot or wherever, just ask for concrete bonding agent

, but patching concrete in a way that will last more than six months is not just a matter of goobering more on -- you generally have to cold-chisel out all the loose stuff back into good sound concrete and chisel in a 'key' and in some cases add rebar. Phone someone, honest. It is surprisingly not that difficult for d-i-y to make the problem worse.

How much space for our run would I need? Space is not limited so give me a number, that would include space to expand the flock.

As big as you can stand to build.

already has power to it... it just needs to be hooked up to the house power again, and it has a fuse box inside the door we're going to relocate to the other end where the bunker is, and it will be turned into a breaker panel not fuses

By an actual electrician who will also inspect and fix any exciting old 'features' of the wiring, yes?

how many ceiling lights should I have? currently there is one flourescent tube box up there, I wanted to put in a regular light fixture and use the caged outdoor lights from home depot as my ceiling light, and for lightbulb I was thinking of buying the compact flourescent daylight bulbs... would this be a good idea? or should I stick with the regular compact flourescents?

Don't use compact fluorescents... the ballasts work poorly in cold weather and not at all in REALLY cold weather, which of course is a nontrivial part of the year up here

Personally I would stick with the fluorescent, making sure that it had a cold-weather ballast. <shrug> If for some reason you have a thing against fluorescent lights, one 75-watt bulb should be sufficient or two (spaced equidistant on the ceiling) if you really like Bright Light or want a backup for if one of 'em blows.

would regular chicken wire be okay to make the partition wall?

Yes.

Beautiful old structure you got there, btw - will make a great coop

Have fun,

Pat​

We're going to have someone look at the foundation, but we're doing it ourselves... we've done it before, but I think cold chiseling it would be a good idea too!... the apron on it is in pretty good condition apart from the two holes, but i insisted that we extend the apron for extra stability, the building itself is in really good shape... structurally sound, etc.... built to last!

As for the electrician, we're doing it ourselves since we already know how to do a panel, and my dad wires computers and well... we did all the electrical in our old house, its minimal stuff really, but we will have an electrician inspect it afterwards of course! We always did/do.

I'll just get the lower energy incandescents then, I know that you can get the daylight bulbs in incandescent too.

It's a fantastic building, aside from the foundation its in great condition​

 

[tvtaber]

For the outside run, assuming you cannot just let them out the door to free range (which is what I would do in your case) a round number is the number of hens x100. Minimum is hens x10, but that is really tight. 100 sq ft per hen is sustainable, meaning you will not end up with a stark moonscape complete with craters from dustbathing.

 

[Chick_a_dee]

Quote:
Yeah we can't free range, we have Fishers, a visiting Skunk who delights in spraying our garden with his stinky Skunk juice every morning, a large German Shepherd who lives on the property next to us that if he got loose, could easily make the 600ft run over here and kill them, plus our own dogs, and god knows what else there is out there... but I know we have Fishers, because I found a dead one in our barn that froze to death over the winter. We're thinking of starting smaller, then eventually expanding to cover the whole of the valley to the left of the house, which is home to about 10 trees, and too buggy for us humans to have a patio down there.

 

[Chick_a_dee]

Bumping because I didn't get many replies that were directly on-topic, if this isn't okay, I'm really sorry.

 

[SterlingAcres]

That'll make an awesome chicken palace