Building a chicken coop

I am converting a 12 x 16 shed to a chicken coop.
I will be putting steel on the walls and the roof.
Before installing the steel, I want to add a few
windows, and a "door" for the chickens. I would
also like to make a door that can be opened to
collect eggs from the outside of the coop. Are
there any other features I should consider adding
to this coop? Now is the time to do it for sure.
Also, I want to have it raised up off of the
ground, what is a good height? Any ideas to make
it easy to clean?

I will post pics when I have it done

google is ur friend

High enough to permit good air circulation and to discourage critters from spending the night there. Make sure your access door (for you) is large enough to permit easy cleaning. They will fill it up soon enough. I am sure you will find lots of opinions. I have seldom seen a subject that brings em out of the woodwork like chickens.

long day lighting for more egg production.

Add a large vent in the peak that you can open and shut. I've never lost chickens in the cold, but heat gets them. Also, make sure the center of the building doesn't have anything you can hit your head on when you stand back up with a pitchfork full of nasty bedding. Make provisions to be able to fix a light on a timer in the winter. I use one of those desk lamps with a clamp on it plugged into a timer. Also, make a raised box on the floor to keep the water up out of the bedding so that your water heater isn't close to flammable stuff in the winter. I have my feeders hang at about the same level as the chickens' backs. They mess up less that way.

Put the door for you opposite of the door for them. Until a batch gets older they will scatter when you walk in the coop. It is lots easier when they can go out rather than fluttering and raising dust in there with you holding your breath. That also helps because you can partition off part of it when you get a new flock and can still give the young ones room to move about.

I see your point about getting eggs, but I really think you want to go in there. You will have a chance to see everyone and have them be used to people. There's nothing worse than chickens who don't see people enough and freak out every time you walk around the side of the pen. I have a batch that has free reign of the whole farm. I feel like the pied piper because when I walk somewhere they run to follow me. They are the best laying 13 hens I have seen. Way better than the two dozen in the other house (and they are twice as old). They are very content and like people. The others are a hot mess - I won't have that breed again.

Put a square of mouse poison in each wall stud. It may only last five years before it is gone, but that will be five glorious years. I use bait boxes and wish I had more in the walls. I've never had chickens bother mice poisoned with bait. If they can't get to the bait you are good to go.

Make it so that You can Give them Feed/Water, Without going Inside, I'm gonna Put a New roof on mine Real soon..Larry

steel on the walls? I think it will be awful cold in there in the winter!

notjustair - I have had mice eat the poison in the wall, then come looking for water. The chicken eats the mouse and then the chicken dies!

What do you have for a floor? My 4x8 coop has a plywood floor. Got a piece of linoleum and covered it making clean up easy. Coop is sitting on 4 x6 skids making it easy to move.

Notjustair really did a nice job of telling you all the basics. I can tell from his response that he knows what he is talking about. 'Especially about the chickens scattering when you walk into the house. I'd get the widest walk in door you can. That will be the door you pitch the manure out of.......probably into a wheel barrow. I have my chicken house elevated off the ground about 18 inches. 'Seems to work. I wanted that so as to prevent/hinder other critters from burrowing into the floor. I did put an electric fence on the top of my outside chicken wire. The darn coons couldn't go through the wire, so they went over. The electric fence really worked good ever since I installed it.

As Korn say poison in a chicken house is a good way to have many dead birds. My chicken will eat mice if they see them and so not many mice in my 2 chicken houses.

I've found dead ones laying in the bedding (not chicken killed) and the birds hadn't touched them. Maybe it is the kind I use or something.

Forgot to add - I have three chicken houses - I use one for butchering turkeys as well. For all of them I dug a trench a couple feed deep and put hardware cloth in it (three foot wide) for the outside pen of the coop. I then backfilled the trench with gravel. It is hard to dig through for predators. I switched over to chicken wire after that and stitched them together using electric fence wire. All of my pens have chicken wire roofs. The coons sure do get in there if you aren't crafty and plan ahead.

Our summer range shelters were A frame type, about 12' x 16', with 2"x4" mesh floors. Manure fell right through, and we just pulled them off with a tractor to expose the manure to clean up. Nests were built in the end with an access panel from the outside. The main laying house where they were kept through the winter had a solid floor with "built-up" litter. About 8-12" thick bedding of wood shavings or sawdust. We only skimmed off the top of the litter with a 5 tine fork about once per week. The depth of the litter and bacterial action took care of the rest. The litter was never removed, just skim off the top and replenish it occasionally. We had separate roosts that had platforms under them that also had to be cleaned out every week. Dad used this method from 1928 until 1962, and had 2,000 layers. All of the feed was carried by hand, and the manure was removed the same way. My hands are very well acquainted with a 5 tine manure fork and a #14 grain scoop.

As a kid I hated cleaning the chicken coop. With that in mind I built a 8x20 coop on skids with no floor. Feeders,waters,roosts and nest boxes are installed on the interior walls. When they foul it I hook onto it with a tractor and drag it to a fresh spot in the pasture. I was worried about predators digging under so hinged wire that lays flat when parked. No losses yet.
Cuts down on feed bill. No rats or mice so far. Stays sanitary. Easy to maintain. I only keep about 12 hens at this time. I figure this rig will handle 30 or so.

Neighbor has chicken. He has a big problem with critters, some eat the eggs, some eat the chickens. He is constantly trying to keep them out. Only advice I can give is make strong enought to keep critters from getting in. He used to let his chickens free range. Now he keeps the the few chickens he has left locked up.

If you build a door for the nest, make the nest a roll-a-way nest box. Easier to collect eggs and stops the hens if they take to eating eggs.

A dusk to dawn door for the chickens is real nice to have too but you could add that later.

Listen to Dean, no floor is real nice too but you may be commited to what you have at this point.

Check out book coop by micheal perry its good for a smile

For annual clean-out make a door big enough to accept the bucket of your tractor.

I read that - it is a good read!

We needed one here in northern Michigan while I fix up my in-law's house. We got an old 18 foot pull-behind camper trailer for free and converted it for chickens. Works great! It's mobile too. We had many days here this winter at 22 below F and no frostbite on our chickens. Note the the chickens were originally at our New York place nearly 800 miles away. So I made a small coop and stuck it on an old boat-trailer. Towed them 800 miles to northern Michigan and they now live in that camper. After seeing how well the camper has worked - I'd never build another coop from scratch.

I get a little carried away when I build or remodel, but when I remodeled my 10X14 coop a year ago I double walled it with insulation in the walls and ceiling. It was a lot cooler in there last summer. Five windows line the south wall and one window in the east wall and a screen on the top half of the walk in door. With one heat lamp shining on the roost this winter the inside temp was never colder than 15 degrees when it was -20 with a wind outside. Daytime temps were 35-40 on a sunny day with outside temps at zero. The expense of double walling and insulating will never re-coup but that is the way I did it. Jim

The opening of the coop should be facing the morning Sun if possible. Also have enough windows to allow for sunlight throughout the day.

What's with the steel wall? Instead, install internal light fixture to help with warming up the coop during cold weathers.

Yohannes
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