Who else had their chicks BEFORE they built their coop?

[Egghead_Jr]

We used a childs playhouse for our first coop as to not put much into the chicken experiment until we were hooked. I fitted it with floor, roosts and secured the windows. It worked so well I did'nt have the actual coop built until they were laying eggs that late fall.

 

[Moonblossom]

I have 6 chicks about a month old in a very large rubbermaid container with a heat lamp sitting in my master bedroom closet at the moment and we have no coop and since it's pouring rain and supposed to for the next week we arn't sure when we will get ours even started. We'll need at least a weeks worth of no rain for our yard to dry out enough to put one up so here's hoping for dry weather in SW Washington.

 

[Fastdog]

6 chicks in a large tote, just cleared the land where the coop is going. Hope to start laying the ground work today.

 

[mcf3kids]

I hope I can say my coop is built before the chicks arrive but I am not banking on it! The winter here has been so hard that the area I will use is still covered in snow. My chicks come in 6 weeks but I do have the makings for a brooder and we have picked out our coop design. If mother nature will cooperate I just might have a coop by the time the chicks are 3 weeks old (I HOPE!)

 

[Mervin]

Yup. The DW was sort of irritated that I went and got chicks w/o building the coop. I put together a brooder in a bathroom I was remodeling and told her we had at least five weeks to worry about it. I was on track, pretty much, to get it done. Then we had a bit of a wind storm and a couple of weekends' work went right down the drain.

crash

I built a temporary pen for them to move outside, which was basically an 8'x8' brooder box with a roof but outside. That worked pretty well for a couple of weeks until I got their second coop finished.

My wife wants to get a small herd of Nigerian Dwarf goats, but won't do so until I have a small barn standing. My mom just bought a place with a small barn on it. We might be getting those goats sooner rather than later...

 

[schellie69]

I used an old dog house for my 1st coop

 

[hickchick55]

That would be me. Got 9 peeps yesterday and the coop is only a plan right now. We got more than a foot of snow on Wednesday, plus we are going to use part of our woodshed and about 4 cords of wood need to be moved. At least I had the brooder ready, although I think it will only be good for about 2 weeks. Hope it warms up soon.

 

[stoneeater]

Found BYC last Oct. Chose a breed I'd like to get. Read as much as possible making plans to have chickens by 2012.
Then god started to have a good chuckle.
Then this woman my wife works with said "Come and get 4 free bantam yardbirds". My wife said that we were'nt "chicken ready" yet. Well an unprepared week later she gave us 10 more.
Talk about learning by immersion. Now I have 14 2-5 week old chicks in a pen in the bathroom. Just settled on a coop design yesterday. Will attempt to start building this weekend. Do have a massive unused dog pen/ chicken run though. Just have to chicken ready it.

 

[carolinasculpture]

We didn't get the "real" coop finished until after the first several eggs!

I had to climb into and then craw to where they had created a nest until we were finished.

 

[Urban Chaos]

well duh!

Rationalized by "if you dont have the chicks, you wont be as motivated to build a coop" theory.