Hi All - I've had what was supposed to be my nice big 12 x 12 coop under construction for a few months now. My boyfriend has been working on it off and on but it's been a very slow process. To make a long story short, my boyfriend is no longer in the picture. While I'm pretty handy, I have very little construction experience and now I have a partially built coop that I don't know what to do with. On top of that I'm feeling like I may have gone the wrong direction with this coop. I would like to maintain a laying flock as well as two breeding flocks (Silkies and SQ BRs) plus it'd be nice to have a grow out pen. Rather than building a big coop I'm wondering if I should have done a shed row type coop with several separate pens.
Here's what I'm working with:
I can either continue with this build and try to finish out the 12' x 12' coop as is. There is room for about an 18' x 18' run in addition to that. My other option is to pull this apart, cut the platform in half, and start over with a shed row type coop. It would be 6' x 24' long and would most likely be divided into 4 separate 6' x 6' pens. The back of the coop would sit on a 3' or 4' wide terrace and the front would be on legs. By having most of the coop's footprint in the terrace area it would leave room for a run that is approximately 18' x 30', possibly larger. Here is a picture of the terrace, this is not the terrace it would be built on but they look very similar. The other one was just too overgrown to get a decent picture
:
The shed row coop would look something like this, only raised off the ground about 2'. I'm thinking it would be 4' tall at the back and 5' or 6' at the taller front side:
So if you were in my shoes what would you do?
Here's what I'm working with:
I can either continue with this build and try to finish out the 12' x 12' coop as is. There is room for about an 18' x 18' run in addition to that. My other option is to pull this apart, cut the platform in half, and start over with a shed row type coop. It would be 6' x 24' long and would most likely be divided into 4 separate 6' x 6' pens. The back of the coop would sit on a 3' or 4' wide terrace and the front would be on legs. By having most of the coop's footprint in the terrace area it would leave room for a run that is approximately 18' x 30', possibly larger. Here is a picture of the terrace, this is not the terrace it would be built on but they look very similar. The other one was just too overgrown to get a decent picture
The shed row coop would look something like this, only raised off the ground about 2'. I'm thinking it would be 4' tall at the back and 5' or 6' at the taller front side:
So if you were in my shoes what would you do?
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