Restoring An Old Hen-house

[ctchickadoodle]

its so gorgous!
i am impressed with your motivation!
keep the pics coming
steph

 

[griffinkid02]

Ok, another week down, STILL didn't get finished on account of a ladder that was in a witness protection program posing as the steps to a tree stand from this past years deer season...... This should be fixed by THIS Thursday. It had better be or my Nankins will start picketing me on the housing conditions.....

SO to start off. So picks from week 6 of the project with better lighting and not so blurry:




As you can see. The reclaimed siding is working wonderfully. I have not positively ID'ed the kind of wood it is, has a bit of a cedar tint to it, however seems very lightweight for cedar. Anyway with the tongue and groove reversed to hide the painted side it lines up so very beautifully on my wall and I truly love it.

Next; on to what I did this past Thursday and Friday. As has been pointed out, with greenhouse fiberglass roofing winterizing my coup should NEVER be a problem for a South Easter winter. However hot and humid summers COULD be a bit of a concern, especially if my birds are trying to sleep in a natural oven.

So, after much concideration I decided some windows on the side that sees the least amount of rain (and not coincidentaly the side I'm re-siding anyway) were called for. That left me trying to decide the best methode of installing said windows. I don't know if it is visible from the above pics but there is a 2x6 full stud that runs the full perimiter of the coop even with the low side of the roof. I was amazed at how perfectly level and square that beam is after all these years and decided that it was the most likely candidate for holding windows. I measured the width between the studs and cut some 2x4s:


Next I nailed the frames together; pictured with said frames is the site supervisor for this construction zone, Granny. My grandmother actually owns the property on which this coop sits and has been thrilled with my efforts to restore it. As the current understanding is that the property will be mine in the property fullness of time anyway, she is always excited to help, advise, and guide me to the best method of doing whatever I'm doing around the place (even when I'm not actually LOOKING for that advice

) Plus she loves birds and chickens. i've already promised her that next year I will try to get some guineas just for her to sit on the porch and watch.




Then, I measured and cut hardware cloth to fit each square and DG help me hold and pull it tight and even to staple it to the frames:




And yes, to anyone that is looking, I swear that THAT is the skill saw that Noah used to build the Ark, don't ask how my Irish decent DG ended up with a biblical artifact, I don't know. But she takes CARE of all her tools and honestly, I don't think that I could buy a brand new one that would run the way that one does. All hail the Holy Handgrena.... I mean Skillsaw.

Well, after all that time spent building the Windows, I also had another heavily details oriented task to do. Some of us may have noticed that the coop doesn't have a door. Kind of a problem if I want to keep chickens IN it, and more importantly hungry mammals OUT. Will the truth is that the coop DOES have a door, it's a rickety old homemade screen door (minus the screen, that rusted away long before I was around). That door is hinged to swing inwards and stays tied back since it doesn't really accomplish anything to close a screenless screen door. I'm planning to reinforce that door and cover it too in hardware cloth and use it as a "summer door." However, I also built a more solid general purpose door. unfortunatly I forgot to take pics during the process, so here are the windows hung in the back wall:





And just to keep from being called a tease, here is my solid door. Build and hung on 1/3 of a brand new door frame:



Next week i hope to pick up some more 1x4s to finish that door fram and have the ladder to finish the back siding. Then i will get a few sheets of the left over fiberglass panels which I have just confirmed we still have and replace the one missing from the front right corner of the roof, then it's chicken moving time!

 

[perchie.girl]

I am soo loving your progress. Very good Job... and I love Grandma... I love Guineas too. I just hatched out my very fist hatch ever of..... Drumroll..... Three count em three Guineas. Hee hee.

They were with a batch of pullet eggs .... None of the chicken eggs hatched but The guineas did... I put in four Guinea Pullet eggs and one was not firtile but the other three hatched. Woo hoo.

Guineas are a hoot.

deb

 

[canesisters]

I am SO impressed with all that you've accomplished! You've been an inspiration to my own 'old shed to new coop' project.
Keep up the good work!

 

[highpointfarm]

awesome bro Hopefully it will be done and ready by the time eggs start to drop

lol naw you can almost plan on it... Youll find little things here and their to make their lives easier

 

[griffinkid02]

LMAO! Don't you DARE mention eggs yet, Caleb! I swear if you curse me, lol.... I already had a cockrel start crowing at 4.5 weeks

 

[highpointfarm]

lol MAH BAD

 

[ButchGood]

I am so jealous . You are so lucky to have that structure to work with. Its going to be an awesome coop. Can't wait to see the finished project with chickens running around.

 

[Going Quackers]

It's really looking good and we too have the pleasure of a rather antique skillsaw too... nothing runs like a classic!

 

[highpointfarm]

YAY 1k posts xD lol