Roosts, poop boards or shelves

[maryboland]

I will start building my coop as soon as snow leaves the ground here in western Colorado (Carbondale). With BYC Forum's help I have finalized my coop design. Now I'm thinking about the interior. Decades ago, when my kids were little, we had some chickens and kept them in a very casual way. They free-ranged about the place and went into a small coop at night. A coop with no windows and one 60 watt bulb that was on all night (that was the advice I was given at the time). Their little house had a shelf about 2ft off the ground, about 1 ft deep and maybe 5ft long. They roosted there, laid there eggs there, just about lived there when they weren't outside. (It's hard to remember but I think they went outside even in winter. I know the door was open all day even in winter.) They did fine that way.

Now I'm building a larger, better-designed coop and run for 12 Araucana layers, which will have a 1/4 acre fenced pasture for summer as well as their covered run for winter. For inside the coop, I'm thinking of having one community nest box at the low end of the coop, and then, at a higher level, a 1ft deep removable shelf for a roost/sleeping area. I like this idea because the coop will be a fresh air coop even in winter and the hens can have more bedding to nestle down in on a shelf rather than a narrow roost. And it should be simple to remove the shelf every week or two for cleaning, so it will serve as a roost and poop board combined. Then the bedding in the 64 sq ft of actual floor space should not need to be changed all winter. What do you guys think about this?

 

[lauralou]

I would consider more than one nest box for 12 hens.

 

[Ridgerunner]

A community nest box should work fine.

I'd make sure the roost is clearly higher than the nesting box. I suspect you are doing that. I'd put the actual roost above the droppings board so they are not roosting in their poop.

I'm not sure what your lowest temperatures will be. As long as they are not in a draft yet ventilation is adequate, they can handle quite low temperatures. If you have not seen them, these two articles maybe quite helpful in this regard.

Pat’s Winter Coop Temperatures
https://www.backyardchickens.com/web/viewblog.php?id=1642-winter-coop-temperatures

Pat’s Ventilation
https://www.backyardchickens.com/web/viewblog.php?id=1642-VENTILATION

I'd really consider a bare droppings board under the roost. Twelve hens will put out a lot of poop. If you mix the poop with the litter, you may wind up with a large volume of material to dispose of. Even without the litter mixed in, you'll have a certain volume. Different people do things different ways. Most people use linoleum or paint the droppings board to give them a surface easy to scrape. I secure a piece of heavy plastic that I can gather up and take out to my compost heap, shake it of, them reuse it. For whatever reasons I have plenty of these pieces of plastic but one lasts a long time.

I'd also consider making the roost removable in case you want to remove it later for general cleaning or wathever. I drilled holes in the end of my roosts with matching holes in the supports and dropped 5" nails in as pins. That has come in handy.

Hope this helps a bit.

 

[patandchickens]

I agree, one community nestbox (i.e. much bigger or longer than a normal single nestbox) should be fine.

If your shelf arrangement works for you, then certainly keep on doing it

- I am pretty certain that if I tried that with my chickens they would end up marinating in poo but everyone's situation is different and besides I could be wrong <g>. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it"

Good luck, have fun,

Pat