A few years ago, I spent the summer house sitting for some family. My brother was off on his amazing backpacking trip through Europe with his new wife (I know, lucky them).
While they were away, I watched after their dogs, ducks, chickens, and desert tortoise. I would go out each morning to check the coop for eggs. Each morning, I felt a child’s excitement lifting the lid to the nesting boxes. It never got old seeing those brown little eggs peacefully laying in the soft bedding. I was in love!
When I bought my own home a few years later, I became obsessed with the idea of owning my own chickens. So, I began making plans. If you’re still on the fence about chickens, check out this post to see if they are a good fit for your lifestyle: Considering becoming a chicken mamma?
Luckily for me, I had some experience with chickens (three months worth). I learned what things I liked about P&A’s chicken coop, and what things I hated! This information was incredibly helpful when drawing up my own plans.
With my inspiration as a guide, I started making lists of the important features that I wanted on my own coop. Some of the important features included (in no particular order):
1. Nesting boxes at hand level for easy harvesting
2. Large access door for easy cleaning
3. Room under the coop for the chickens to rest
4. Access to the nesting box from outside of the run (in the winter, it can get muddy/poopy in the run so I only want to walk in there when I absolutely have to.)
5. Access to the food and water from outside the run
6. Ability to open and close the little chicken door from outside the run
With these features in mind, I began drawing up some plans:
You can’t see it here, but inside the coop I had plans to build roosting bars and hooks for food and water.
I showed my drawings to my dad, we made a few tweaks, and then got to work. At first, I wanted to do everything by myself. This project was my baby! But once we got started, I realized what a big undertaking this actually was. For example, I never even thought about needing to level the ground.
When my dad came over to help, that was the first thing he did! Thank goodness he was there because I am sure I couldn’t have built such an awesome coop without him!
We leveled the ground by digging into the existing earth and placing stone blocks in the holes. Once all of the blocks were level with one another, we had a good base to work with. After the ground was ready, we made a base for the coop. Our base ended up being 4X6 feet.
This is the perfect amount for 6 chickens to live comfortably*.
*It is good to give chickens space in the coop, but not too much space. In the winter, things get pretty cold here in Idaho. It is important to keep the coop small enough that the chickens can keep it warm with their body heat and possibly a small heat lamp.
There was a surprising amount of math involved in getting all of the angles to line up. Remember, measure twice, cut once! In order to keep costs low, we were using scraps from previous projects (my dad is a carpenter, hence his mad building skills).
After the framing was up, it was time to add the walls and trim.
It is really starting to come together!
After the trim, we put up the siding. Lucky for me, we were able to side the whole coop using scraps from a previous job.
Next, I caulked all the seams and prepped for paint.
After the caulk dried, it was time for paint. I have had some incredibly frustrating times buying the wrong paint colors in the past (they look so different when they are actually on the wall). I decided to go with the sample colors found in a painting booklet. It turned out pretty cute!
A few finishing touches later and the chickens were ready to move in! Here is the *almost* finished coop about 6 months after the chickens moved in. You will notice the unfinished nesting box lid… But other than that, everything is done!
This coop turned out great! It is easy to use and the chickens love it! The nesting box is at an easy height for daily harvesting, the small window opens up for ventilation during the hot summer months, the chicken door slides open with a pulley accessed from outside the run, and the food and water can be changed easily through the large door (on the other side of the coop).
I have been living with this coop for quite a while now and so far I have no tweaks to suggest for people planning their own DIY chicken coop. My *obsessive* planning payed off!
Source: CATHERINECONTINUED |BUILDING A DIY CHICKEN COOP
