please show off your roosting bar dividers!

[aart]

*Staple gun

Beware using the Arrow50 type staples/gun.......might not stay put and the loosened staples could be deadly

 

[Krugerrand]

Love the illustrations and I like the inside of your coop. But I do have a question. Even though there's a divider there; what will stop the hen from jumping down, walking over to, and getting back up on other side of the roost so she can start creating drama again?

Nothing ... except for the desire to sleep. Eventually the need for sleep overtakes the need to assert power. Then, the others can claim a spot.

 

[Granny23]

What type of chickens are you keeping? And how many birds roost on that bar?

Normal height is 1 foot and higher from the coop floor. In your case it's measured from your drop board.

You might not need a divider but add a second roost bar on the other side of the coop.

One foot off the floor? My girls are probably 5 feet up! I used a small handtowel this week to seperate my one rude mean hen from my 2 babies. I used round wood closet bars. They seem big enough to hold on to a squat on. I see big square pieces of wood in some pictures. Are those better for them?

 

[JoeCT]

Fwiw, I have a 3" 'round' dowel roost bar and a 2"×3" 'flat' roost bar (wide side up) and they only sleep on the 'flat' one.

 

[My Very First 6 Chickens]

Love the illustrations and I like the inside of your coop. But I do have a question. Even though there's a divider there; what will stop the hen from jumping down, walking over to, and getting back up on other side of the roost so she can start creating drama again?

lmao, thats SO funny to me to envision. I can picture my Rosie doing this. Shes so insecure. Her 'take over everything' is not limited to roost time. All the hens dont want to roost with her at all. I added another roost, but its lower and they havnt used it once in the month there. 3 hens now choose the nest box over dealing with Rosie. Rosie followed them and chats away and pokes them to take over the spot! Its all mixed up. Roost time Drama is for real. I cant cope, lol.

 

[Krugerrand]

One foot off the floor? My girls are probably 5 feet up! I used a small handtowel this week to seperate my one rude mean hen from my 2 babies. I used round wood closet bars. They seem big enough to hold on to a squat on. I see big square pieces of wood in some pictures. Are those better for them?

The hand towel may be the better way to go. I had one that settled in for the night on the edge of the cardboard. Fortunately, I checked on them early, moved her and took down the cardboard.

 

[cityeggs]

The hand towel may be the better way to go. I had one that settled in for the night on the edge of the cardboard. Fortunately, I checked on them early, moved her and took down the cardboard.

View attachment 3372902

I've had similar things happen - they'll take whatever they can get! When I dared to add the dropping board, my poor (full-sized) cockerel was so scared of it that he slept balanced on the 2x4 header to the nesting box (meaning, he crammed himself up against the wall on a 2x4 set lengthwise, and managed to balance there all night, judging from the evidence below him). And another cockerel kept trying to roost on the piece of cardboard that I put over the bottom half of the dog crate door to protect him from being pecked by the hens

 

[cityeggs]

Thank you!

What type of chickens are you keeping? And how many birds roost on that bar?

Currently, there are 3 that sleep there - I have 1 Australorp, 1 red sex-linked, and 1 Wyandotte, all just over a year old. Next month, I will be adding 2 "Alchemist Blues" from Alchemist Farm (as far as I can tell, they're mostly Isbar/Silverrudd Blue), and I'm thinking of including 1 more chick - standard to large breed to that group, (right now leaning towards a Marans, or possibly a Bielfelder, since I'm really tired of dealing with accidental cockerels that I can't keep). I know I need to add more roost space before they're added to the roost situation.

Normal height is 1 foot and higher from the coop floor. In your case it's measured from your drop board.

I had heard that height, though I've definitely seen pictures with minimal distance between roost and drop board from people on here who seem to know what they're doing, as long as they're above the nest boxes. Part of my thought was ease of cleaning - both in terms of the lack of splatter and my ability to reach it (the coop is elevated already), so that's what I started with. I can definitely play with the height to see what happens - the easiest being just getting rid of the drop board and leaving the roost bar at its current height before I try anything else.

You might not need a divider but add a second roost bar on the other side of the coop.

It seems like the easiest would be to set a second bar just above the top of the nest boxes parallel to the current one Do you see any other options? Diagonal would be difficult and not allow as much distance between birds on one end.

If I do the parallel one above the nests, is there an easy way to protect the space below the nests so all that poop doesn't get tracked into the nests and make the eggs a mess? Would you just make a roost frame like you show that doesn't go all the way to the nest box, instead of attaching the roost to the wall? Or adding some kind of roof material under the 1' in front of the nests? Or both?

 

[cityeggs]

This was my original plan for a temporary roost divider. It's a quick project. Know your roost measurements before starting, mainly the thickness of placement. Gapping the boards 1 foot per wall will prevent 2 birds from occupying the space.

This is awesome - thank you! That looks just like the kind of design that I need - easy, so I don't invest a ton of time/energy/materials into something that may not help, and I can figure out whether it helps quickly! I will be sure to use the correct type of staples - I think what I have are the ones that are the dangerous ones that aren't strong enough.

 

[Tonyroo]

The partition measurement was a general size. If you really want it to work, you need the height of the partition higher based on the gap from the chicken head standing on the roost and the ceiling. If you make several partition on 1 roost, the gap between each board is 8 to 12 inches depending on the size of your birds. Making the gap closer restricts them from bothering others on the same bar.