Our Chicken McMansion

[JaneJohnReed]

That is a very nice coop and run. I see you have the chairs set up to watch the chickens.

I think the 5-gallon waterer can go where you currently have the waterer in the run. Although, the water would stay a little warmer inside the coop in the winter. But that does not seem to be a concern.

Your hens look like production reds or Red Sex Links. What are your hens?

Oh yeah, we like to take glasses of White Zinfandel and sit in the chairs and watch the girls instead of TV. Before the dog killed three of our original hens, we used to sit out while they free ranged. They liked to jump up on the arms of the chairs and into our laps. We don't do that much any more and the new hens don't really pay much attention to us when they are out anyway.

 

[farmgirlroots]

This is all still new and we're tuning things, but it looks like with our five hens the feed will last a full week without any concern. That's not going to allow any of the feed to have any issues. So far, the only problem we're having is the hens wasting the feed. They flip it with their beaks and it's all over the floor! We're scratching our heads on this but we think that perhaps we've got too much feed in the tray and need to lower the PVC pipe some to slow the flow of the feed into the tray. Any ideas from more experienced people would be appreciated on this one.

Our set up allows for a second feeder, just like the first one, can be put in to double our capacity when we enlarge our flock.

I had the same problem with food waste so I revamped my feeder. It now has a horizontal section of PVC with 2" holes drilled into the the 4" pipe. It eliminated the waste problem. They still stick their whole head down in the 2" holes and flick food with their beaks, but it stays in the feeder. You could do something similar if you removed the grey tray and added horizontal pipe so that your feeder would be in an upside down T, with the ends capped.

I tried to post a pic but for some reason it isn't working. I posted a picture in this thread though if you are interested (if my description is confusing). https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/814693/need-ideas-to-build-cheap-outdoor-feeder-and-water-shelter

 

[emmons314]

Love it! Especially the feeder. We've been trying to come up with a better one, and I like your concept!

 

[JaneJohnReed]

I had the same problem with food waste so I revamped my feeder. It now has a horizontal section of PVC with 2" holes drilled into the the 4" pipe. It eliminated the waste problem. They still stick their whole head down in the 2" holes and flick food with their beaks, but it stays in the feeder. You could do something similar if you removed the grey tray and added horizontal pipe so that your feeder would be in an upside down T, with the ends capped.

I tried to post a pic but for some reason it isn't working. I posted a picture in this thread though if you are interested (if my description is confusing). https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/814693/need-ideas-to-build-cheap-outdoor-feeder-and-water-shelter

Just looked at your pictures and that makes a lot of sense. In our case, we could have the two verticals full height (50") to double our storage. And, the horizontal could be longer (?) to provide more feeding space. Anyone know how far the feed will flow horizontally down the pipe in that configuration? Could we use a full 3 foot horizontal piece?

It's hard to think about modifying the coop already but if we don't get this feed wasting problem stopped, we're just inviting rodents and wasting feed money.

 

[farmgirlroots]

Just looked at your pictures and that makes a lot of sense. In our case, we could have the two verticals full height (50") to double our storage. And, the horizontal could be longer (?) to provide more feeding space. Anyone know how far the feed will flow horizontally down the pipe in that configuration? Could we use a full 3 foot horizontal piece? 

It's hard to think about modifying the coop already but if we don't get this feed wasting problem stopped, we're just inviting rodents and wasting feed money.

I would think if you used a 3 ft section horizontally you would be fine. As long as you drill enough holes and make them big enough to stick their heads into so the food doesn't get stuck sitting somewhere along the way and gets icky. If I remember right the horizontal section I used measures just under 2.5 ft long.

 

[Math]

Thanks for the pictures and ideas for feeding and watering. Your set up looks good. I have 26 hens and I need to improve my feeding and watering systems so I have fewer daily chores. Again I say thanks.

 

[CorineM]

Love it! Love the PVC feeder! Excellent idea!

 

[Minime1959]

Our original coop was a pretty small chicken tractor. We lost three of our six chickens to the neighbor's dog so free ranging them became very rare. And, we really wanted to not only get our flock back up to six birds but actually expand it to perhaps twelve. It seemed the tractor was too small for six girls to properly exercise in, let alone twelve. So, we started looking for how to set up something that would work better. We spent a lot of time reading anything we could find here and looking at all the great pictures. This is what we came up with:

We bought a 10' x 12' wooden lawn building from a lumberyard. It has a full ridge vent and large double doors. It lacked windows and other features to make a coop, so we went to work. Here we've added windows - opposite of each other - and have framed in the 12' x12' run.


Here's the opposite view showing the run without the 1/2" hardware cloth installed.


We added a partition to separate the 'human area' from the 'chicken area' that will house our supplies and some gardening equipment.


Here's our roost with poop tray underneath. We're using a 'chicken litter' that's actually a horse product to eliminate odor and to make cleanup all so easy.


The nesting boxes are cantilevered outside the coop to save space and make egg gathering simple. Here we had two of the boxes blocked off but they're open now.



This is our chicken door (simple out-swing type, but we drool over the automatic doors out there), and grit feeder (from Petco).


And, here's our PVC pipe / Petco tray feeder. It holds three gallon of feed and works well.


We use wood chips inside and in the nesting boxes, and have just started putting sand in the run (boy, that's gonna take a bunch of bags). We are extremely happy with our coop and thank all of you for being here and giving us so many good ideas on how to build something that works so well for us. Oh yeah, the girls love it too!

Why sand?

Our original coop was a pretty small chicken tractor. We lost three of our six chickens to the neighbor's dog so free ranging them became very rare. And, we really wanted to not only get our flock back up to six birds but actually expand it to perhaps twelve. It seemed the tractor was too small for six girls to properly exercise in, let alone twelve. So, we started looking for how to set up something that would work better. We spent a lot of time reading anything we could find here and looking at all the great pictures. This is what we came up with:

We bought a 10' x 12' wooden lawn building from a lumberyard. It has a full ridge vent and large double doors. It lacked windows and other features to make a coop, so we went to work. Here we've added windows - opposite of each other - and have framed in the 12' x12' run.


Here's the opposite view showing the run without the 1/2" hardware cloth installed.


We added a partition to separate the 'human area' from the 'chicken area' that will house our supplies and some gardening equipment.


Here's our roost with poop tray underneath. We're using a 'chicken litter' that's actually a horse product to eliminate odor and to make cleanup all so easy.


The nesting boxes are cantilevered outside the coop to save space and make egg gathering simple. Here we had two of the boxes blocked off but they're open now.



This is our chicken door (simple out-swing type, but we drool over the automatic doors out there), and grit feeder (from Petco).


And, here's our PVC pipe / Petco tray feeder. It holds three gallon of feed and works well.


We use wood chips inside and in the nesting boxes, and have just started putting sand in the run (boy, that's gonna take a bunch of bags). We are extremely happy with our coop and thank all of you for being here and giving us so many good ideas on how to build something that works so well for us. Oh yeah, the girls love it too!

Do you live in a cooler climate? We are building a 42 ft run with a cement floor due to predators. I thought about layering sand over the cement but was told sand will burn the chickens feet during the hot Texas summers.

 

[Brooks_]

Why sand?

Do you live in a cooler climate? We are building a 42 ft run with a cement floor due to predators. I thought about layering sand over the cement but was told sand will burn the chickens feet during the hot Texas summers.

This is a very old thread. Feel free to start a new thread for your questions/needs. That said, welcome to BYC and yes, OP was in a cooler climate. The idea of sand over concrete will not give good results.