Wood Idea

Dont Fly the Coop When Learning How to Build a Chicken Coop

If you plan to raise chickens, you will need to build a chicken coop to house and protect them from inclement weather in addition to natural predators. Hens tend to produce fewer eggs when they are uncomfortable from extreme heat, cold, wind or rainy weather. Therefore, providing all your chickens with a protective, comfortable place to roost will be beneficial to egg production and the future of new chicks. In addition, a chicken coop will protect your feathered friends from predators like snakes, rats, and hawks as well as any diseases these predators may carry.

Learning how to build a chicken coop starts with knowing how many chickens you plan to house and raise. The standard rule of thumb for most coops is allotting four to five square feet of space per bird. That means the chicken coop dimensions would be 4 x 4 to 5 x 5 if you had four or five chickens. You should also take into account height clearance for yourself so that you have enough space to stand upright when you are in the coop, whether it is for egg collecting or maintenance.

Your chicken coop should have good ventilation so if you plan to build a solid enclosed structure (perhaps similar to a small storage shed), make sure you incorporate screened windows along with a door that opens inward. There should also be nesting boxes (one per every two or three chickens) in addition to roosts for the birds. Consider some type of light or electrical outlet to plug in lights or heat lamps. Your climate may necessitate heat lamps during cold winter months. Lights can also trick a chicken into laying eggs year round rather than seasonally, a great investment should you want to have a supply of eggs all year.

Typical materials needed to build a chicken coop include:

-- 2" x 4" lumber for framing

-- 4" x 4" posts for wall support

-- Plywood sheets for walls, flooring and roof

-- 1" x 4" and 1" x 12" boards for nesting boxes

-- 2" x 3" boards or 1?" round wood dowel rods for perches

-- Chicken wire or some other wire with small holes to prevent chicken escape or predator entry

-- Cement to secure 4" x 4" posts in the ground and possibly for the coop foundation if preferred over plywood

-- Screen windows for ventilation

-- Screen door for entryway

In addition to the materials you need to build your chicken coop, a variety of tools, hardware and accessories are needed. You can expect to purchase different size nails, staples, metal joists for the roof and floor, electrical wire and outlets, window and door latches and hinges. Tool-wise you will likely use a saw, hammer, staple gun, shovel, saw horses, a measuring tape, post-hole digger and metal snips for cutting the wire.

Choose a chicken coop design plan that best fits your needs in regards to size and configuration. You can expect a pressure treated pine 2" x 4" piece of lumber to be around $4 to $5 for 8 in length while the 4" x 4" posts are approximately $13 to $18 each for 8, depending on the wood quality. Pine 1" x 4" boards cost about $10 for 5 while 1" x 12" boards are about $20 to $25 each for 8. Pine plywood sheeting costs about $10 to $15 for a 2 x 4 sheet with ?" thickness. If you are not handy with a hammer or home improvement projects, learning how to build a chicken coop will take some time - possibly several weekends. However, if power tools and lumber are your thing, you likely will need just a weekend to construct a basic coop for your chickens.