post your chicken coop pictures here!

[Sylvester017]

Not quite done yet.

Nice construction - envy all you talented craftsmen!

I know you're not done yet but as I put my 2 cents in like another post you'll probably want to line the roost/coop floor with some sort of easy-clean sheeting or smooth linoleum. Wood retains stains and uric acid odors - both unhealthy conditions for chickens that bedding alone won't solve. The place our 4 silly chickens like to sleep for the night is in the 3 nestboxes so a couple hens have to double up in a box. They have a roosting pole but prefer the nestboxes. So what we did is line the wooden box bottoms with custom fit plexiglass to keep the OCD hens from scratching up splinters into their toes/bleeding toenails and to make easy clean up of uric poop straw beddimg.

I love the height you put on the coop. Some newbies don't realize that low coops make it harder to reach broody hens or harder at clean-up time. Good aforethought by you !

 

[luckyclucky]

Nice construction - envy all you talented craftsmen!

I know you're not done yet but as I put my 2 cents in like another post you'll probably want to line the roost/coop floor with some sort of easy-clean sheeting or smooth linoleum. Wood retains stains and uric acid odors - both unhealthy conditions for chickens that bedding alone won't solve. The place our 4 silly chickens like to sleep for the night is in the 3 nestboxes so a couple hens have to double up in a box. They have a roosting pole but prefer the nestboxes. So what we did is line the wooden box bottoms with custom fit plexiglass to keep the OCD hens from scratching up splinters into their toes/bleeding toenails and to make easy clean up of uric poop straw beddimg.

I love the height you put on the coop. Some newbies don't realize that low coops make it harder to reach broody hens or harder at clean-up time. Good aforethought by you !

Well thank you! The base is actually just a re-constructed large dog house. We just ripped the roof off and moved some boards.

As far as the bottom in the inside; it's just wood-pattern linoleum. I cleaned thier starter cage that had cardboard at the bottom. Won't make that mistake again.

Do you suggest placing linoleum at the base of the nesting boxes as well? We have them in there but just wood at the moment. We'll be finishing them off before they start to lay.

 

[Aronia]

Beautiful!

 

[Sylvester017]

Well thank you! The base is actually just a re-constructed large dog house. We just ripped the roof off and moved some boards.

As far as the bottom in the inside; it's just wood-pattern linoleum. I cleaned thier starter cage that had cardboard at the bottom. Won't make that mistake again.

Do you suggest placing linoleum at the base of the nesting boxes as well? We have them in there but just wood at the moment. We'll be finishing them off before they start to lay.

How much linoleum/sheeting and where you use it is up to you. We HAD to plexiglass our nestboxes because of one particularly OCD hen that damaged/splintered her toes scratching the wood so obsessively that we had to take her to the vet twice. To stop the problem we were forced to use something hard in the nestbox bottoms. I've seen some professionally built Amish coops that had individual low-rim hard plastic trays in each of their nestboxes for easy removal. Any lining that makes your life easier is worth the effort. We have to clean out our nestbox straw daily because the poopy chickens sleep in them plus lay their eggs in them so lining the wooden nestboxes from uric poop was a necessity. Lining makes it easier to clean up a broken egg too because they soak right into the wood when broken. A lot of these little suggestions would have made life so much easier 3 years ago when we started keeping a coop. To this day I am still getting good new ideas and this coop thread has been one of my 2 favourites on BYC.

 

[jmayday]

ALL DONE!!!!!

 

[aart]

How much linoleum/sheeting and where you use it is up to you. We HAD to plexiglass our nestboxes because of one particularly OCD hen that damaged/splintered her toes scratching the wood so obsessively that we had to take her to the vet twice. To stop the problem we were forced to use something hard in the nestbox bottoms. I've seen some professionally built Amish coops that had individual low-rim hard plastic trays in each of their nestboxes for easy removal. Any lining that makes your life easier is worth the effort. We have to clean out our nestbox straw daily because the poopy chickens sleep in them plus lay their eggs in them so lining the wooden nestboxes from uric poop was a necessity. Lining makes it easier to clean up a broken egg too because they soak right into the wood when broken. A lot of these little suggestions would have made life so much easier 3 years ago when we started keeping a coop. To this day I am still getting good new ideas and this coop thread has been one of my 2 favourites on BYC.

That's a habit that can, and should be IMO, be broken.

 

[brandy00]

My chicken coop. We added heavy welded wire behind the chicken wire.

And here is the latest work in progress. Converting my boys old playhouse into my brooder coop. Still working on the inside and trying to decide on the size of the run.

 

[jtbass2756]

My chicken coop. We added heavy welded wire behind the chicken wire.

And here is the latest work in progress. Converting my boys old playhouse into my brooder coop. Still working on the inside and trying to decide on the size of the run.reat
Great job on both...can't wait for inside picts...trying to get ideas for a coop about this sizel.. I love what you have done

 

[GAchickennewbie]

Here is the coop for the 3 chicks. They turn 6 weeks old on Monday and really enjoy their time outside. Will be putting them in tonight. All we have left is to put a few nesting boxes in. They seem to enjoy snuggling in there when getting outside time with one of my hens.


.

 

[suzwil19]

Almost done with our chicken tractor.