Wooden Playhouse to Coop Conversion

[redhen689]

Last week I happened to find a wooden playhouse on ebay. I bid on it and won.

It is made of wooden Dutch-lap siding attached to 2X4's. It was constructed in panels so it can be easily disassembled and moved. The floor is made of 2X6 pressure treated lumber. It is about 54 inches wide and 60 inches deep.
I plan to put hardware cloth on the windows for the summer. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the door opening yet.
I'd like to cut the deck off in the front even with the house and possibly raise the whole thing up off the ground a little.

The windows are only large enough to accomodate 1 nest box, if I decide to go that route.

Any suggestions? What are the potential problems of having pressure treated lumber for the floor, should I paint it? put vinyl flooring on it?

 

[Stewzoo]

I have an old play house converted into a coop. My floor was 2x8's painted. I just make sure that I put heavy layers of bedding (usually straw) in there, and have never had a problem. We found some cheap/free small double hung windows and exchanged them out for the playhouse ones. Now in summer I can open the windows, in winter they can be shut/locked and insulated. We had to make our own custom door because the opening is an odd size, but it works great. We used the pink foam boards for insulation and hung plywood over that. It is very cozy and the birds seem content in our cold Wisconsin winters. Since we filled our window areas with actual windows, we made built in nesting boxes on a wall with out any windows. This has worked well. We also found a feeder that could be hung to the wall to save floor space. It was actually a pig feeder, but it works the same as poultry feeders. Nice score on Ebay. It's going to be cute!

 

[kiwiegg]

Redhen, you could screw some exterior rated plywood to that pressure treated flooring (when it's dry) then adhere some FRP paneling to the plywood. Here is a description of what FRP is;

USDA approved, Class C FRP panel can be used in food processing areas, restrooms, shower and tub walls, animal enclosures, surgical rooms, and workshops, as well as many other uses where health and sanitation are concerns. Will not rust, peel, dent, rot, splinter, corrode, mold, mildew, or stain. 3 times less expansion than NRP or PVC panel

I'm using this stuff in my coop. When you want to clean your coop you can spray the *##@! out of it! Treated lumber off-gases nasty stuff too - probably not good for chix.

 

[redhen689]

Thanks for the suggestions.
I was concerned about the pressure treated lumber, I had wanted to at least seal it someway. Thanks for the suggestion of the FRP's, I've seen that installed in coops... and it bathrooms. Maybe I can go pick up a sheet of it tomorrow.

I started making an upper half to the door, and hope to finish that tomorrow. I even found matching hinges.
I'm hoping that my husband will help me move the panels to the backyard and help me assemble it. We'll see.

 

[janelle18]

I am in the process of converting and old tree house into a coop as well! Mine is quite old (20years) but in good shape! We tar papered the roof and shingled it to offer protection from the rain, for the floor we put down linoleum (got a cheap piece for 10 dollars at a flooring store) which i hope will make it easy to clean! Like Stewzoo, we are going to have to build a custom door for the coop. For their nesting boxes we took two boards off the back and put the box attached to that with an opening to gather eggs without going inside. I wish i had a picture to post, but unfortunately I don't.Tree house have a good general structure to convert into a coop! Nice Score!

 

[tyjaco]

very nice!