Pics of nest boxes

[Chicken Woman]

I have heard several people use different boxes ? Different sizes ?
My DH is willing to build me some new ones as i have plastic crates and they kick out all the nesting materal through holes. Would anyone like to share pitures of their nesting boxes ? Please !!

 

[mlmadura]

I have had 3 different kinds and my chicks refuse to use them -

I finally gave up and layered the bottom of their coop(I dont put any food or water in this area so I dont have to worry about poop) (it's only about 5 foot wide by 2 foot deep and 3 foot tall) with about 5 inches of straw -

now they are laying like crazy!!!!!

 

[al6517]

Here are mine, I hope this helps.
AL

 

[Kikiyo]

I made nest boxes out of the box that the cat litter came in lol!

 

[FrChuckW]

Lori, for most breeds a 12" x 12" x 12" box is sufficient. FOr some of the larger breeds you will want to adjust the size to fit.

If you go to the forum board on Coop Designs and Construction I am sure that you will find several pictures on it of peoples nest boxes.

Also depending on the breed you want to place the nest boxes 18"-24" off the floor level of your coop. Some people have used plastic milk crates, storage boxes for nest boxes as well. You will what to have some sort of landing board in front of the boxes to keep the hens from roosting on the edge of the nest. You want 1 box for every 3-4 hens.

Hope this helps.

 

[gumpsgirl]

Sure! I built these by myself and am getting ready to add another row onto the bottom, so the hens will quit squabbling with each other! LOL! They were very easy and only took me about two hours, cutting wood and all.

 

[FrChuckW]

Quote:
Very nice, and you can probably do that out of one sheet of plywood too! If you have a Home Depot or Lowes near you they will even give you the first two cuts free. Here is a link to a site in the UK that has some building plans for making breeding cages for his son's budgies, but can be adapted with a little bit of skewing to make nest boxes as well. His diagrams are downloadable, he even has a plan to build hosptial cages as well.

 

[Kitchenella]

Heres mine. Its easy and so easy to clean. Just throw it away and get another one. So far I've only got one hen laying (3 more growing up) and she loves it. Started laying about 4 weeks ago and has recently layed8 eggs in 9 days.

Peggy

 

[BayCityBabe]

I use milk crates that were cut at an angle. No one at my house is very handy

and a friend offered the crates... I know what you mean about how crates don't hold the nesting material. I did solve that by lining the bottom with a piece of old t-shirt.
(I am sorta jealous that you're gonna get new nests...)

 

[speckledhen]

These were our first ones, then this year, we removed the top made from flashing, so I included a pic of how they look now and how they are accessed from outside the coop. The last one is in the coop addition, but they prefer the originals for some reason. We have others in two other coops, but they arent much different from these: