Three of our chicken coop designs (The Garden Loft, The Garden Coop, and The Garden Ark) have an integrated henhouse and run. So your chickens are free to move between the two areas as they wish. (You can add a door between them if you like.) In some cases, this means that your flock might choose to roost in the secure run at night, rather than inside the henhouse.
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We’re blowing it up in this fourth ride of the Krewe of Coops, featuring a dozen examples of coops from customers who’ve modified The Garden Coop walk-in chicken coop design to build larger, wider, deeper, taller. Enjoy the parade! Read More
In the urban or suburban garden, limited space, pests, wary neighbors, and the like can make the idea of keeping chickens seem like more hassle than it’s worth. But by designing and building the right kind of coop, you can quickly get past these hurdles and add a whole new dimension to your garden.
Here are seven tips to put your coop project on the right path. . . .
A well-ventilated chicken coop helps keep your hens from suffering and your neighbors from complaining. Of course, you do need to stay ahead of any odors, making sure you balance out their poop with plenty of high-carbon bedding like straw, wood shavings, leaves, or shredded paper. We use the deep-litter method and continue to add straw as the chickens add droppings. This mixture begins to compost in place, and the volume builds only slowly. From time to time we move it all to a compost bin to finish doing its thing, then incorporate the rich fertilizer into the garden.
NOTE: The pictures in this post feature coops built by us and by customers of our chicken coop plans. Click on them to learn more about each DIY chicken coop build.
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Dale sent us pictures of his amazing garden and chicken coop he built using The Garden Coop walk-in chicken coop plans. Among many other additions, he built the henhouse walls to the ground on three sides, attached attractive outboard nesting boxes, and added rectangular windows to the henhouse. The rest of the post is from Dale. . . Read More
Cindy in Rhode Island sent us this picture of her Garden Coop build, all decked out for the holidays. The rest of this post comes directly from her: Read More
Richard and Ellen shared several pictures of their Garden Coop build along with notes about how they customized it for their California backyard. The rest of the post comes from them. . . Read More
Reva hired a local handyman to build a modified Garden Coop to house her backyard chickens. She sited the coop beneath a large yard tree and reduced its size so that it would fit the space perfectly. Inside the henhouse, she framed in a raised lip around the hens’ entry hole in the floor to keep the litter in place.
Thanks to Reva for the pictures and ideas. Check out our coop plans to build your own stylish chicken coop or tractor. Or click to see more examples of what others are building.
You know you need to protect your chicken coop from the elements outside. Wind and sun, rain and snow take their toll on your poultry pen over time, and a good wood sealer or exterior paint on the outside of the hen house goes a long way toward preventing this damage.
But what about protection from the “elements” inside the henhouse? Face it, a lot more comes out of a hen’s vent than just fresh eggs. And depending on the design of your henhouse — whether you have a special poop tray, a slotted floor, or a bare floor covered in bedding — you have to consider whether you want to paint the hen house walls and floor to make cleaning up their droppings easier.