What is your most clever coop/run idea?

[Wise Woman]

Well, I don't know that this is especially clever, but I am going to have a yard hydrant installed in my run and have a heater for the chicken's water as well. It will save me from having to haul hot water from the house daily in the winter. I currently go out and retrieve current water container, bring it in, run it under hot water until I can break the ice up, empty it, clean it, refill it with hot water, then tote it back out to the coop, sometimes through 3 ft of snow then set it in the coop. Next morning, repeat.

So now, I will have a heater to keep the water from freezing in the first place, plus, I also have an electric tea kettle that I can just fill, plug in and then carry out with me to the coop to add some really hot water their water on really cold days. And duh, why I never did this before I do not know, but I am going to buy a second water container so that I don't have to empty, scrub, fill and return all at once. I will just switch them out each week and scrub the soiled one at my convenience. Will make my morning routine a little easier.

So I will be able to fill them right in the run, I won't have frozen water to deal with and will have an extra water container available to make dealing with frozen or dirty water easier. On the mornings I am having a lot of pain, this will all seem like a God send. Not rocket science I know, but will make a difference in my little life.

Oh, and I will also be enclosing the area around the hydrant with river rock so that it won't get the floor of the run wet. I am thinking of putting a hydrant out in the goat pen as well and doing the same things with their water.

 

[BrokenRoadFarm]

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Holy smokes!! That is a beautiful coop and run!!

 

[bryan99705]

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No, go with something like cookie sheets or school lunch trays, Figure the length of the bird x 2 since you don't know which way they will face when they roost. Also suggest they are easy to remove for hosing down and made with a slick finish for easy cleaning

 

[bryan99705]

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Why not use a heated water bowl or heated fount?

 

[bryan99705]

Use a drawer design for the poop board that rolls out the wall of the coop for easy access to clean

 

[SAHMof2]

Oooo, I like that. Thanks so much. In that case a very thin piece of melamine would work with its finished slick surface? I could even wax it yes? This excited me!

 

[krcote]

I just like my run in general

I am able to open the pop door from the outside, which many folks have done as well.

Broody coop that has been much more handy than I had imagined for isolation, baby chicks and broodies of course

 

[SunnyCalifornia]

I put a wire shelf under the roost of my newest coop, and installed a sliding poop board underneath, that I line with newspaper. Super easy cleanup. Roll it and throw it away!

Here's a pic of the wire shelf inside the coop, before I put on the front and roof. The poop board isn't seen here, but its on roller bearing slides underneath.

For my banties, I recycled spools, cutting out the inside, so that I could put a waterer in, and it would stay clean, and then above it, is a hollowed out spool for a nest!

 

[ShaunaCH]

Well, this isn't my idea, but I love the idea of putting a garden on top as the roof. Keeps the chickens warm in winter and cool in summer and provides us with a pretty garden. We don't have it built yet, so perhaps it's not as ideal as I'm thinking, but it sound really nice to me.

 

[confusedturtle]

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I am so curious about this whole grass garden in the run thing, sounds very cool. Anyway you could post a picture of it, I'd love to try it