Hello Everyone, I am trying to figure out if putting roosting bars above my nest boxes would be okay. The 2x6 that is above the nest boxes would be removable with 12"x6" peel-n-stick tiles for easy clean up. What do you think? Will the covered 2x6 be enought to trap the crap or will I need a better drop pan? Also how are your drop pans built?
Generally the roosts are put as far away from the nests as possible. It looks like you have a good setup figured out, but I still would be leery of it - the nesting boxes could still get covered in poo.
I have roosts over droppings boards over nestboxes, and it has worked great for me, in three different pens. Make sure that the droppings board is wide enough and ideally it should extend past the nestbox opening a few inches (you would THINK poo would fall straight down, but, especially when you are cleaning the droppings board, not always ) If you take a look at my personal page, the photo with the sussexes shows how I've got it set up. Except that the nestboxes have been pushed back further under the droppings board since the photo was taken. (e.t.a. - you will need MUCH wider than a 2x6 however... 12" wide is minimal, 14-16" much better. Also, I am not sure what the bottommost roost on your diagram represents, but if this is a ladder-style roost, you may very well have problems because the nestboxes will be higher than some of the roosts and thus some hens are likely to roost in the nestboxes. ALL roosts need to be SIGNIFICANTLY higher than the nestboxes) Good luck, have fun, Pat
Quote:There you go again with your good chicken knowledge. I can't view pictures at work from the BYC website so I will have to wait until I get home. Thank you Pat, Angie
I even went as far as to put a sloping board above the nesting boxes so the hens could not roost there. If you give them the chance, they will find a way to get droppings into the nesting boxes. Michael
