My husband and I are just diving into the wonderful world of chickens. We are starting to build our coop/run area and I have questions regarding the coop. We live in Wisconsin, so the winters get quite chilly and can have quite a bit of snow sometimes. We plan on using a similar format to the Wichita Cabin Coop plans if anyone is familiar with it.
My husband works in construction and there are always extra materials being thrown out. So, we are going to build our coop with old deck boards he salvaged from a remodel. He also worked on a industrial building project (recycling center, no less) and they had left over heavy-duty steel siding. We figured we could get our coop built with the old deck boards and realizing that there will be gaps, we figured we could put the steel siding on the outside to give it a nice finished look and to seal up the gaps/drafts. We plan to use the steel siding as our roofing material also on the coop and run. Hopefully almost 80% of this project can be used with recycled materials.
So, my first question is, if we box out the coop in old deck boards and cover with steel siding, will that cause the coop to be too warm in the summer or not enough ventilation in the winter? We plan to put the ventilation holes in the roof peek (front and back), so I was hoping it would be "just right"? We plan to put 2 windows for ventilation in the spring/summer/fall (1 on the door and 1 above the nesting boxes).
So, this leads me to my next question. DH has had this large window (double paned - no screen, taken out of a house) sitting in our garage and he thinks that is a perfect thing to put on the back side of the coop (right where they are roosting at night). If I were to guess the size, it would be about 4'x3' and our coop is going to be 6'x6'. To me it doesn't seem like a good idea, but our coop will be at the edge of our woods and the large window will be facing into our small woods protected from the wind. In my gut it just feels like it is inviting trouble to have this big "picture window" with 4-6 birds sitting on their roost all night. He feels that it will let more light in during the winter, but I almost think that it might make it colder - even though it is double-paned? Also, I am not sure if the chickens would prefer to have it darker in there. I plan to add extra light during the winter to keep their egg laying somewhat on track.
I would appreciate any thoughts, experience, etc. on this matter. I want to make this coop right the first time. Thanks!
Wendy
My husband works in construction and there are always extra materials being thrown out. So, we are going to build our coop with old deck boards he salvaged from a remodel. He also worked on a industrial building project (recycling center, no less) and they had left over heavy-duty steel siding. We figured we could get our coop built with the old deck boards and realizing that there will be gaps, we figured we could put the steel siding on the outside to give it a nice finished look and to seal up the gaps/drafts. We plan to use the steel siding as our roofing material also on the coop and run. Hopefully almost 80% of this project can be used with recycled materials.
So, my first question is, if we box out the coop in old deck boards and cover with steel siding, will that cause the coop to be too warm in the summer or not enough ventilation in the winter? We plan to put the ventilation holes in the roof peek (front and back), so I was hoping it would be "just right"? We plan to put 2 windows for ventilation in the spring/summer/fall (1 on the door and 1 above the nesting boxes).
So, this leads me to my next question. DH has had this large window (double paned - no screen, taken out of a house) sitting in our garage and he thinks that is a perfect thing to put on the back side of the coop (right where they are roosting at night). If I were to guess the size, it would be about 4'x3' and our coop is going to be 6'x6'. To me it doesn't seem like a good idea, but our coop will be at the edge of our woods and the large window will be facing into our small woods protected from the wind. In my gut it just feels like it is inviting trouble to have this big "picture window" with 4-6 birds sitting on their roost all night. He feels that it will let more light in during the winter, but I almost think that it might make it colder - even though it is double-paned? Also, I am not sure if the chickens would prefer to have it darker in there. I plan to add extra light during the winter to keep their egg laying somewhat on track.
I would appreciate any thoughts, experience, etc. on this matter. I want to make this coop right the first time. Thanks!
Wendy