Our "Oak Abode" chicken coop

[Aurora21]

I know Oak Abode and the coop plans you followed. You did a splendid job. It looks great!

 

[South Dakota Guy]

I know Oak Abode and the coop plans you followed. You did a splendid job. It looks great!

Thank you!

 

[aart]

My wife is only 5ft 2in so we had to lower the nesting box a little. It was either that or build steps to it for her.

Just as well, better that it's lower than the design apparently suggests.

Some tips abut heights:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/coop-stack-up-how-high-stuff-works-well.73427/

 

[LittleMamaBigPapa]

Raccoons are a huge threat. If all you have is chicken wire, make sure all access to coop is closed every evening. A six foot fence won’t keep out a coon, possum or fox.

 

[countryladyNH]

Great job!! Lol, your chickens have a cool, 'mid century modern' show home!!

 

[PoleFarm]

Oak Abode Coop
My wife and I just finished building our chicken coop and we are rather proud of ourselves. We have almost no carpentry experience, so it was quite the challenge for us. We saw this coop on YouTube and I have posted the link above. We live in South Dakota in a city. so we are operating under some restrictions. We are allowed to have no more than 6 hens and no roosters. The coop should be no larger than 30 sq ft and the run should be no larger than 60 sq ft. We purchased the plans for the coop from Oak Abode's ETSY shop. This coop is slightly larger than the allowed size at 32 sq ft. This is because plywood and studs come in 8 ft sections. I could have modified it to 30 sq ft but I am hoping no one from the city shows up with a tape measure. We liked the raised design because it allows the chickens to have a shaded and protected area and it adds a stealthy extra 32 sq ft to the size of our run (which is already accounted for by the coop). We purchased a cheap metal run on Amazon that is 6.6 ft by 10 ft. This gives our chickens 66 sq ft + 32 sq ft =96 sq ft of run space for 16 sq ft per bird. The coop provides 5+ sq ft per bird. We enclosed the underneath of the coop with hardware cloth. Unfortunately, our bargain run is only enclosed in chicken wire but we know the risks. We live in the city and have a 6ft privacy fence for our backyard. The only predators I have seen are a neighbors cat, hawks and the occasional bald eagle which shouldn't penetrate the chicken wire. The designers of the coop live in Wisconsin which has similar weather to us. Summers are short and mild and winter is long and brutal. In winter we will most likely wrap the run in a tarp or some kind of plastic sheeting to minimize wind and snow exposure to our flock. We have 3 silver laced Wyandot hens aged 9 weeks and 3 gold laced Wyandotte chickens aged 15 and 10 weeks. We chose them because they are known to be cold hardy. Here are photos of the finished coop. If there is an interest, I will post photos we took during various stages of construction.

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Well done you two! This looks great! Sounds like your chickens are very happy with their new home. They should be!

 

[South Dakota Guy]

Well done you two! This looks great! Sounds like your chickens are very happy with their new home. They should be!

Thanks! They seem to enjoy the coop and the run. I think this weekend I might post some pictures of the coop during construction. I am sure that there are other people without carpentry skills that need to be shown that they can build their own coops instead of wasting money on a inadequate prefab coop, like we did.

 

[QODTMWTD]

That's spectacular. I love the flooring you used in the coop.

As for securing your run, when we did ours I couldn't stand the thought of trying to dig deep enough to bury hardware cloth. We had a bunch of unused metal bird spikes lying around, though. We'd bought them to keep swallows away from the houses, but that was a big fail. I screwed them as close as possible to the bottom 2 x 4 of the run so the spikes would deter anything trying to nose around the bottom looking for an ingress. Your application doesn't have 2 x 4s, obviously, but wire or tie wraps might work to secure spike strips parallel to the bottom tube. They're very light and wouldn't add much weight.

 

[NameIwish]

I forgot to include the interior photo. Our nesting box is split into two nesting areas. The small protrusion on the end of the coop holds our heated water container. I will need to add a hole for an extension cord before winter sets in. We wanted to put the water above the bedding to keep it clean. The roosting bar is set to 24 inches below the ventilation openings to keep the flock out the wind during the winter. I am considering putting a higher summer roost in where the flock can get some direct breeze and also look outside. The low slope of the roof in on the north side of the coop. Right now the space between the rafters is open. I will add hardware cloth soon but I am toying with the idea of closing that area and the west side vent during the winter. Our prevailing winter winds are from the west, northwest and north.

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[NameIwish]

Oak Abode Coop he coop plans from ETSY shop. $18.29

https://www.amazon.com/?tag=backy-20 This link does not work - pages does not show the pen enclosure, just a list of stuff.

Where The floor covering you used looks familiar. If it is the thin stuff with a grey/gray backing, you may be disappointed as -with the stuff we bought - that backing is organic paper of some sort that does not do well with moisture but gets along nicely with mildew/mold and such.

Suggest you consider FEED BAGS as they are inorganic, strong, waterproof and washable - did I mention free an colorful? If you can get te glue they use to make them, you should be able to do your floor with three bags by seaming them together. I use them in coops with smaller floor area (one bag covers it all) and simply peal them up, dump the accumulated shavings and (to quote Nancy) poo poo in a barrow or onto the ground, Hose them off and re-insert.