Wisconsin "Cheeseheads"

[chikenscratch]

Ok, Granola Girl....your coop might look that clean on day one, minute zero, but think ahead to cleaning it. Does that board pop out for scraping and washing? Do you want to bend over to get/put food under the ledge? Do you want to stoop under it to shovel out poop and shavings? With any design do yourself a favor and think about how you will move around in the coop while cleaning. Example from my experience, I cannot get a wheel barrow into my coop, so when I shovel poop and shavings out I have to haul it by the shovel outside and into the wheel barrow. It is tiring for sure and I wish I'd designed the doors to open out and double doors or a wider door.
I have 7 hens, a 7 x 12 coop (this includes an enclosed run and roost portion where the food and water are as well, plus an elevated portion where there is another roost and egg laying area). I only heat the small area if it gets below zero and none of it is insulated. We buried concrete pavers around the perimeter and built the coop on top with hardware cloth not chicken wire stapled onto the frame and then trimmed in. It has a metal roof and a dirt floor (covered with pine shavings). Our roosts are made with fallen tree branches. The biggest looks like a ladder and can be removed from the coop whole.
We have had zero issues with varmint, flooding, frost bite, mites, etc.
Good luck with it all. I agree with the others, build it larger. Even if you don't succumb to chicken math, your chickens will be happier and healthy!

 

[chikenscratch]

Here are some images of our coop.

 

[jvls1942]

good late afternoon,

I want to know the advantage of a poop board ?
My chickens seem to poop where ever and when ever they feel the urge. mostly on the concrete sidewalk leading to the coop door.

I modified one side of the new feeder today.
it seemed that there was just not enough room for the chickens to get their head into the trough without bumping their combs on the wood.

I increased the slot along the bottom up to 2 inches so the feed could "ooze" out a little better.
this feeder would work just great with pellets or granuals,
but I need it to work for ground oats and corn.. that is what I will be feeding my meaties . in the mean time I bought 100 pounds of the feedmill's egg formula which is a lot like the ground oats and corn.

found 2 eggs in the nests today.. maybe they are going to start producing again ?
Just in time, too. last night I had a lady call looking for some butchering chickens.. I told her to wait for 2 weeks until I decide if these are going to lay or die ..

If you build a coop only 4 feet wide, plan on cutting a foot or two off of your cleaning shovel handle.

compare it to shooting pool in a closet .

a wide door for a wheelbarrow is a must.
cleaning a coop is no picnic, so why make the process last longer than it should ?

I should send a picture of my coop cleaner outer .. I do not have to do anything but drive the tractor away with a full bucket .

I strongly recommend concrete floor.
with a dirt floor, after awhile, the ceiling gets higher and higher..

I do not recommend linoleum floors either. they can become slippery.

...

........jiminwisc........

 

[bigzio]

Evening before the hunt to all.....I agree with making your coop as large as possible, like others have said. My one coop is 10X16 with a 6 foot wide people door. It is pleasant to visit daily and chores aren't really a chore....my smaller coop is 6X12 with a standard 3 foot door...it is also fun to work in with only 7 hens in there and 8 foot ceilings for more space to move around....bigger is better. 10 square foot per bird in the Winter when locked up works best here, it's all about happy birds.I know they are happy, cause they smile...

Just finished checking the eggs for fertility. We have 9 clears out of 24 kinda like I suspected.....15 going strong and I will candle again at lockdown....my roo's really have their favorite women, and that's ok. If I can add 6 to 10 fresh pullets to the flock every year, that's just about right for us here.

bigz

 

[Celtic Chick]

Ok, Granola Girl....your coop might look that clean on day one, minute zero, but think ahead to cleaning it. Does that board pop out for scraping and washing? Do you want to bend over to get/put food under the ledge? Do you want to stoop under it to shovel out poop and shavings? With any design do yourself a favor and think about how you will move around in the coop while cleaning. Example from my experience, I cannot get a wheel barrow into my coop, so when I shovel poop and shavings out I have to haul it by the shovel outside and into the wheel barrow. It is tiring for sure and I wish I'd designed the doors to open out and double doors or a wider door.
I have 7 hens, a 7 x 12 coop (this includes an enclosed run and roost portion where the food and water are as well, plus an elevated portion where there is another roost and egg laying area). I only heat the small area if it gets below zero and none of it is insulated. We buried concrete pavers around the perimeter and built the coop on top with hardware cloth not chicken wire stapled onto the frame and then trimmed in. It has a metal roof and a dirt floor (covered with pine shavings). Our roosts are made with fallen tree branches. The biggest looks like a ladder and can be removed from the coop whole.
We have had zero issues with varmint, flooding, frost bite, mites, etc.
Good luck with it all. I agree with the others, build it larger. Even if you don't succumb to chicken math, your chickens will be happier and healthy!

Ok cs, it looks like your coop pics were taken even before day one minute zero.

So you can't open up that door on the enclosed area, park a wheelbarrow right in front of it & rake it out? Bummer.

Ouch. With a concrete floor, either don't make the roosts very high or try to have deep litter to keep them from injuring their feet. Bumblefoot could occur.

Jim, a poop board under the roosts is awesome. I think the birds crap more over night than they do all day long. Ye gads! It makes cleaning the coop much easier since the majority of the doo is on the boards. Just clean off the boards every few days, then you don't have to clean out the rest of the coop for longer periods of time. This works especially well if you do the deep litter method.

Glad to hear the fertility was a little bit better than expected Bigz.

 

[irishrovr]

Jim, a poop board under the roosts is awesome. I think the birds crap more over night than they do all day long. Ye gads! It makes cleaning the coop much easier since the majority of the doo is on the boards. Just clean off the boards every few days, then you don't have to clean out the rest of the coop for longer periods of time. This works especially well if you do the deep litter method.

I have poop boards under the roost in the chicken tractor where it piles up quickly at night. They're easy to remove and scrape off daily. In the new coop I had the hubs hinge the roost so I can hoist it out of the way to clean underneath. In the old coop the roosts are stationary and a royal pain to clean under. Once all the chickaroos are in the new coop I'm going to gut out the old one and start over.

 

[chickendreams24]

We don't have poop boards yet but they're on our list if we get to keep the building we are currently using. The farm(owned by DH2B's family) might be tearing it down. Stupid if you ask me it's perfect with two separate sides which we could make a few different pens on one side for breeding or growouts. I think the larger side is 64 feet something like that maybe more. Plenty of room for our flock. I hope we get to keep it. Our coop is still a work in progress and if we don't keep the building we would have to finish the coop and immediately start on another. If we keep the building we could finish the coop and use it for breeding or a grow out, even for meaties.

Fingers crossed we get to keep it. I love the family farm but I'll be honest, I'll be glad when we can be Kings of our own castle and not have to wait for approval for anything.

What kind of birds does everyone have I'm curious to know?

We have a mixed flock of Isa browns, slw, EE, American and English orps, silkies, oegb, a mix and are currently growing out/adding speckled Sussex, brown leghorns, white rocks, a light Brahma, English orps, a white sport ccl(I want to add more ccl)... I think that's it ugh I hate being sick I can't even remember what birds we have lol.

 

[Cindlady]

Hi All!

Nothing new.

Night All.

 

[Sclark73]

Had to go into drs yesterday. Me and Anellia have been sick. Both have Influenza and I have phnemonia ughs. We both had our flu shots. Have been having a harder and harder time breathing along with nasty cough. Put me on antibiotics as I have emphysema, asthma and copd. Refused antibiotics for Anellia against my request. I feel we also have bronchitis bur urgent care Dr would not listen to me. Going to keep and eye on her and if worsens, taking her to her ped. As he always listens.
Have another small batch of chicks hatching right now. 5 BLR, 1 SS hatched with 4 more BLR pipped and waiting on the straggler Cc Legbar to pip. Counted the other chicks hatched and theres 22, alot are BYM chicks crossed with either the CCL, Iowa Blue, BLR, Lav Orp and Favaucana going to be a pretty batch of Easter Egger chicks for someone.

 

[GranolaGirl72]

Thank you all for the suggestions. Let me clarify, that photo was an example of poop boards, not my coop. We did have chickens when I was growing up so I am very much aware of their incessant bowl habits, lol. The poop boards would not keep the coop spotless, but would save some cleaning time since the hens will spend a fair amount of time in that particular area of the coop. I will be able to add one more chicken at most to our flock of five as we currently have 2 buffs, 2 ee and one barred rock. That is unless one turns out to be a roo, then he will be culled and replaced next year. Best to ease hubby into the whole process, he was a city kid...
The wide door wheelbarrow suggestions were something I had not thought of so that was great. Our coop will be very similar to what chicnscratch has. How large is the run space below the actual coop? We will have wood floors in the coop and dirt outside and we are also planning to build a low tech tractor to move the hens around the yard. Nesting boxes will be off the floor and double doors will access the 6 foot side of the coop with no lip for easy cleaning. Trying to design a floor plan that makes feeding and watering during winter as easy as it will be to collect the eggs.
Neighbors down the street stopped by to give their support. We don't really care what the ones across the street think.