The Tree Coop

[yakitori]

It all started with 3 guinea fowls. Well they’re gone now I miss them... but that’s another story.

I never intended to keep chickens, but when I got guineas, all the information online said to raise them with chickens ( which I later discovered wasn’t such a brilliant idea), so I went out and got 6 chicks. Okay, I estimated I had 5 weeks to build a coop. Well guess what? That didn’t happen. I didn’t start building my coop *until* 5 weeks in, and it took another 3 weeks to make it livable enough for the chickens. Now it’s week 15, and I’m still not done with the shingles yet . I’ll get there.... before winter.

Here it is - my tree coop! It’s almost completely made of free wood. The most expensive part of this project were the screws. I got real frugal on this one and probably spent $50 in total. But gosh, I don’t ever want to take another pallet apart again!




This 4x4 coop houses 5 lovely birds. (Sadly one chick died on the first day)




Let’s start with the top of the pecking order...


——-The General (right)——-
She’s my black sexlink. A sweet bird who leads the pecking order. She rules with firm but gentle confidence.

She also clucks like it’s the end of the world whenever I pick her up



More descriptions to be added later!
but for now... sleep

 

[LadiesAndJane]

Awesome coop! Is it difficult to clean?

 

[yakitori]

Awesome coop! Is it difficult to clean?

Not at all! I mean it’s pretty small...
The coop itself is at chest height, so no need to bend over when scooping. I use pelletized horse bedding. when expanded it’s like a coarser sawdust. it’s great and I don’t need to change it out, the bedding dries out the chicken’s normal poop and clumps around *and* dries cecal poops, so everything i scoop out is nice, solid and dry. I also dry my used coffee grinds and use that to top up the bedding. It smells great!

Sorry! - falling asleep as I type, so I may not sound very coherent.
I promise to get more photos up tomorrow!

 

[leia_and_friends]

Love that coop; it's very inventive and looks great! And your profile picture is very cute.

 

[N F C]

Very cost efficient! Is there a ladder for the chickens to get up in it?

 

[yakitori]

Love that coop; it's very inventive and looks great! And your profile picture is very cute.

Thanks! That’s my EE no.2 She’s a fast and curious little one!

Very cost efficient! Is there a ladder for the chickens to get up in it?

Yep! here it is! I was going to build them a ramp, but they seem to get up fine with the ladder so I got lazy




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I need to upgrade my coop scoop, this one is a bit too small. I don’t mind spending 5minutes scooping poop in summer, but I’m sure in winter that would be 5 minutes too long

The girls have been dropping some pretty big ones recently!



Here’s the girls today sunbathing. They look so comfortable.



I wondered whether the little ones would do the same, so I brought them out in the sun too. I was rewarded with the cutest pile of fluffy!

 

[yakitori]

Meet my musical chicken: F15. She’s one of my two russian orloffs, and always had something to say about everything. I keep thinking she’s a roo, but I’ve been assured that only Russian females will talk this much

She seems aloof but actually loves attention and a good neck scritch