Raised coops, how tall is the actual coop?

[Wise Woman]

We will be building a raised coop and I have been researching this a lot. But one thing I don't find a lot of info on is exactly how tall is your actual coop? We will be putting a peaked roof on ours so we can have adequate ventilation, but I am wondering how tall the actual walls should be prior to the the roof being added. I will have it raised about 24" off the ground and was thinking the walls should be 4' high. Does this sound right? It is hard to visualize as all our previous coops were 8' tall as my husband was opposed to cutting anything so we had to use whole sheets of siding.

Anyway, it will soon be time to start this project and I am trying to get the measurements down exactly. I would love to hear about your raised coop.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Mine is not a raised coop, but I'd suggest you start at the floor. How deep will your bedding be. Then, where are you putting the nests, on the floor or up on the wall? If up on the wall, remember to leave enough space between the bottom of the nest and the top of the bedding for them to get under there. They tend to scratch bedding under there and plug up that area so leave extra space. Then put your roosts higher than the nest boxes. When designing your nest boxes, remember to account for the thickness of your construction materials and watch how you frame it. The thickness of your framing material can add up. Then leave enough room above the roosts so that when they are roosting they are not in any drafts from your ventilation.

We lay them out differently so there is not a specific one height fits all. It can vary. I do suggest you leave a little extra room and not try to cut it real close. That space gets eaten up pretty quickly, if just from the thickness of your construction materials. And that bedding often takes up more room that you would expect.

Good luck!

 

[Wise Woman]

Thank you. We will be having external nest boxes and one reason is because I am sick of the mess they make under their current nest boxes. This will also give me more roost space by having the external nest boxes. We will be using pine shavings in the coop as we have done for 10 years now and sand in the covered run. The big run will start dirt as it is now. I won't let the shavings pile up too much. Perhaps a couple of inches or so in summer and maybe a little deeper in winter. We will also be using the poop hammock idea under the roosts so that it can be removed frequently and keep the shavings cleaner.

There will be roosts on both sides of the coop with vintage windows as doors so they can look out. We will also be making screens for these openings out of hardware cloth so they can be open during nice weather. The nest boxes will be accessible from the outside and there will be another vent above that for summer as well. The wall that will face the enclosed run will have yet another window for a door and be how they get out. That door can also stay open in nice weather. We will be leaving the area where the roof trusses meet the walls open for ventilation. They will be covered in hardwire cloth though. We will also be putting vents in the peaked area of the roof on both ends of the coop, so there will be ventilation the whole way around the top of the coop and doors on every side for summer.

I am trying to get this all down on paper so I know what I am doing before I start buying the materials. Thanks again for your help.

 

[m_shuman]

We just built a 4X8 raised coop with external nesting boxes that are on the side walls. The front and back walls are 4' 4" tall and the roof peaks to a 6' tall space in the center so I can stand in there to clean it out. The coop is elevated 2' off the ground. We have 2-2'x3' windows that open on the front wall, a ridge cap on top of the roofs peak, two vents above the nesting boxes on the side walls and hardwire screen doors on the back wall of the coop so we have plenty of ventilation in our 90-100 degree days in the summer. We also built the coop in the shadiest part of our yard.

DH also built 2 removable roosts that have an attached board underneath that can be removed and cleaned daily in needed.