post your chicken coop pictures here!

[Chicken Egg 17]

But if u chase her out to many times she just goes in the woods with the others and can be just walking and let's the egg rip the I suspect the other chickens eat it or wild animals do

 

[mamabird615]

This is our coop we are in the process of building!

 

[timothyyoung]

Question about my coop design. I have nesting boxes 13 inches off the floor, should there be a roost in front of those for the birds to hop on first? How high off the floor should the rest of my roosts be?

 

[ShrekDawg]

Question about my coop design. I have nesting boxes 13 inches off the floor, should there be a roost in front of those for the birds to hop on first? How high off the floor should the rest of my roosts be?

I don't think there necessarily needs to be a roost but it may help them land especially heavier birds. Mine can fly to the roof of their coop which is in the run and at least 4 feet high so they should have no problem reaching it but a perch in fron may be a good idea. The rest of the roosts it doesn't matter but make sure they are ABOVE the nest boxes or they will sleep in the boxes since they want to be as high as possible. But it doesn't need to be in the rafters or anything, even a few inches above is fine. Just make sure it of 18 inches off the wall, 12-18 inches below any drafts and if you have more than one roost bar then they should be about a foot apart at least so no one can pick on each other. Besides that, it really doesn't matter.

 

[ShrekDawg]

This is our coop we are in the process of building!

Cute!!

 

[gaitanm24]

No plan used. Made literally from scratch.

 

[bruceha2000]

Question about my coop design. I have nesting boxes 13 inches off the floor, should there be a roost in front of those for the birds to hop on first? How high off the floor should the rest of my roosts be?

How finished is your coop? I ask because (ASSUMING the nest boxes are in the coop) 13" isn't enough room for a chicken to walk under. If they could be raised to 18" you gain that floor space for the birds.

To answer your specific question, they don't need an access perch for 13". They might not even open their wings for that height. I have an access perch at 18" on mine, the "lip" of the nest boxes is about 6" higher. They hop up with maybe a flap. They can get on the 4' high roosts with 3 flaps, including my big Black Australorp.

The roosts should always be higher than the nest boxes. Chickens will typically roost as high as they can get. Mine totally ignore the 2' high roost except as a "halfway" step to the 4' high roosts.

 

[bruceha2000]

No plan used. Made literally from scratch.

Design and build as you go? Pretty impressive.

 

[gaitanm24]

Design and build as you go? Pretty impressive.

Thanks! My husband is pretty artistic which is why I think he was able to do that!

 

[Sylvester017]

Oh, thanks so much for the organic bug product. I wondered! I thought of cardboard as well. We always have cardboard around. Is it on the floor under? There is also an,amish lady near me that has this very thick rubbery flooring that is waterproof I thought about adding over the floor...that or horse stall mats with pine needles or shavings over that. Good to know about under the coop, too! I was just thinking better off the ground (it has runners, just very short) due to snow, snakes, ect. What an adventure! My hubby thinks I am crazy.

A rubbery flooring, horse mats, or installed linoleum product up the inside wall a few inches, or that black waterproof paint some people use on their coop floors/walls, or some waterproofing will be a must over your wood flooring - sometimes chicken poops can be VERY watery and you won't want it soaking into a wood floor. Raising your coop off the ground is always a good idea.

The cardboards we use as flooring is so plentiful and easy to clean out of our little 4x4 Barn Coop metal tray floor. Our chickens don't use the coop except to lay an egg or roost at night so the cardboard works for us with very little poop to clean -- a couple changes per week for us. We use straw in the 4 nestboxes but only cardboard for the floor because shavings, pine needles, PDZ, etc, will all just fall through the ladder hole in the floor. The chickens can exit through the floor to the bottom of the coop or use the slide-up chicken pop-door (white door) to go directly outside. There is an additional black wire kennel run that came with the coop to be attached later.


The cleanout door to the coop is very large and opens on this big side of the coop.



Here's a view of a rounded-edge roost bar, blue nestboxes with straw, cardboard we use to cover the floor of the Barn Coop with the ladder-hole in the floor, and the pop-door is open on the wall (right side) that leads outdoors. With only 4 backyard hens this works for us. More black roost-bar mounts can be seen on the wall of the coop but we only need to use a couple bars - there are 5 roost bars for this coop but we thought them redundant for only 4 hens. The Silkies are cuddlers on the floor inside the cozy nestboxes while the two LFs use the roost poles at night. The Utah manufacturer said this 4x4 coop would accommodate 15 chickens - not IMHO!


There are 3 lower roosting bar mounts and two more upper roosting bar mounts above the windows. This is only a 4x4 floor space but the roof is really high.


My personal opinion is that this Barn Coop will comfortably accommodate only 4 to 5 hens for both health and safety of the hens. I can't possibly imagine the manufacturer's suggested 15 chickens inside this 4x4 space with 5 total roosting bars where chickens can get pooped on from chickens sleeping on higher roost bars! My personal opinion/formula for how many chickens can be accommodated in a coop is to count the number of nest boxes. If there are 8 nest spaces, then 8 chickens would fit safely, if 4 nest spaces, then 4 chickens would fit safely and be healthy, etc. Now, only ONE nestbox is really needed for 4 to 5 hens to lay eggs but I just use the number of nestboxes in a manufacturer's coop to give me the proper number of chickens that will safely be accommodated in the coop space. Manufacturers always exaggerate the number of hens that will fit their tiny coops!