Glorybee
Chirping
We thought we had decided what we are doing for coop placement and now we are not as sure.
We live in the city. There are houses on each side of us and three across the street. We have a double city lot, but pavement takes most of ours with a split lawn area.
Our first option is behind our house, which is somewhat of an alley. It's about 42' long and 6 ish feet wide. We have a 6x3'+ quail house we could convert for our 8 pullets nicely and put on an external nest box. Leaving it where it is now, we'd have 34' of run and could probably easily make it 4'+ wide. The ground isn't super even, so it could be a tough run build. Cant get a small tractor in to it. We'd have to bring in gravel/sand just to keep the run dry in the winter as the run can get mucky in our rainstorms. Much of this run is covered by a roof eve from the house, but it still gets muddy. We could build a gate at each end not accounted in this footage to keep stray dogs out. We have neighbors with roamers. There would be no free range space unless we come up with some movable fencing to get them up on our steep hill nearby.
Our second option is in the front. We have a huge deck and wanted to do a coop and run under it that is a non attached build to the decking. Using just part of the under deck area we have something like 17 x 12 feet plus a few extra under the stairs. We would have to build a completely new coop (pallets) and would do a simple raised coop like 4x8, high enough to give birds room to roam under it but low enough to not hit the 6.5" under decking. This is ideal in that water is right there and we have a compost pile outside of the coop that we could utilize with movable fencing if we ever get some. This is not ideal in that we have a tall deck and everyone can see everything under it. We have no privacy lattice yet to shield neighbors views. Closest is over 20 feet away minimum to the left of us. Stray dogs could bother them at the fence line.
Our city ordinances don't specify that chickens must be in the back yard. We just need to be sure that there are no noticeable odors at the property line and no roosters or peafowl. Without pictures, what do you all think would be best?
We live in the city. There are houses on each side of us and three across the street. We have a double city lot, but pavement takes most of ours with a split lawn area.
Our first option is behind our house, which is somewhat of an alley. It's about 42' long and 6 ish feet wide. We have a 6x3'+ quail house we could convert for our 8 pullets nicely and put on an external nest box. Leaving it where it is now, we'd have 34' of run and could probably easily make it 4'+ wide. The ground isn't super even, so it could be a tough run build. Cant get a small tractor in to it. We'd have to bring in gravel/sand just to keep the run dry in the winter as the run can get mucky in our rainstorms. Much of this run is covered by a roof eve from the house, but it still gets muddy. We could build a gate at each end not accounted in this footage to keep stray dogs out. We have neighbors with roamers. There would be no free range space unless we come up with some movable fencing to get them up on our steep hill nearby.
Our second option is in the front. We have a huge deck and wanted to do a coop and run under it that is a non attached build to the decking. Using just part of the under deck area we have something like 17 x 12 feet plus a few extra under the stairs. We would have to build a completely new coop (pallets) and would do a simple raised coop like 4x8, high enough to give birds room to roam under it but low enough to not hit the 6.5" under decking. This is ideal in that water is right there and we have a compost pile outside of the coop that we could utilize with movable fencing if we ever get some. This is not ideal in that we have a tall deck and everyone can see everything under it. We have no privacy lattice yet to shield neighbors views. Closest is over 20 feet away minimum to the left of us. Stray dogs could bother them at the fence line.
Our city ordinances don't specify that chickens must be in the back yard. We just need to be sure that there are no noticeable odors at the property line and no roosters or peafowl. Without pictures, what do you all think would be best?
