Another post from way back when. We had lost our home when the landlord was foreclosed on, she had collected rent from us each month but didn't pay the mortgage. At the time of the post, we were living in 2 rented rooms in a private home, had 3 dogs and 13 chickens and planters, pots, water bottles, plastic clamshells , even paper bags full of seedlings and cuttings ready to plant. We were into our sixth month of house hunting in a sellers market with only about 15 properties available. Things were pretty grim, but we kept our hopes up by planning what we would do when we found the right place.
At long last, the plans for the chicken coop.
Front
Back
Inside
Ok, not the best drawing and certainly not to scale, just my ideas finally put to paper. But we may not use them.
I found some links online to people using pallets to build everything from chicken coops to storage sheds. Al has jumped on board and is really excited about trying some of them. It's pouring rain right now and has been all day, so will have to wait till we get into the house (and garage) to try to build.
Oh yeah, forgot to mention, WE GOT THE HOUSE! We signed the paperwork yesterday and should have the keys tomorrow.
My brother, who has actually worked with chickens before on a real farm, has also drawn up a quick sketch of what he thinks the coop should look like, so we have some decisions to make.
Brother's Concept
Who knows, we might make one of each and see which works best.
March 2012
In the end, we hybridized using ideas from each plan and making the base out of pallets. Such ambition, so many ideas that in reality were impractical. Having a raised floor and small openings made it hard to clean, awkward to collect eggs and almost impossible to reach the birds. When it came time to build a third coop (actually our fifth, but only the third one we have kept) I went with a much simpler design: 2x4 frame, plywood sheets for siding and roof and a couple of roosting bars. It is big enough for me to walk in, easier to clean and houses all 50 of our birds because they are only in it to sleep at night.
August 2017