How to Build Chicken Coop

Knowing how to build a chicken coop can be a huge financial benefit. However, finding the best how to build coop plans can be difficult. To raise chickens, you should know how to construct the pen as this is necessary for the safety of your chickens. Although you can build it in different ways, sometimes people buy prefabricated ones, or find some free plans to build their own coop.

Building your own coop can be financially rewarding because prefabricated ones are sometimes lousy and expensive. Once you understand how to build it yourself, it would cost you just faction of what you'd pay when you buy one on the market. It is important that your pen is well ventilated from the scorching summer heat, and can easily drain monsoon rain waters. Aside from this, it should have some straw to keep your birds warm in cold winters. 

Where to Begin With Building A Chicken Coop.

The first step in building your pen is to start with a good and practical plan after taking all aforementioned factors into consideration. Therefore, you should first design a bird coop on a piece of paper. In this way, you will know about things that you should avoid, and the ones that you should do.

This will provide you a comprehensive plan and will also answer all your questions and concerns, such as size of the coop, kind of roof, number of windows, and so on. The benefit of starting with a plan is that if you make mistakes in the process, you can finally come up with a prefect coop plan after corrections.

Other than weather, you should also consider the threat from the predators as also poses a danger to your chickens. If you neglect this aspect, all your chickens will be preyed on and you may end up wasting your time and money. Therefore, you should build a wire fence around your chicken coop.

How to Build Chicken House.

Building a chicken house is not that difficult. However, the lack of guidance and inadequate planning may lead to several problems when building your chicken house. There are many ways to build your coop at low cost with decent looks. When learning how to build a chicken house, you must ensure that there are all essential things for their survival. This ensures that your chickens will stay healthy and live in a convenient way. Moreover, spacious area enhances proper breeding and growth in their productivity.

Dimension of the chicken house.

The size of the house depends on number of chickens you want to accommodate in the coop. You should provide at least 4-5 square feet of area for each of your chicken if they will spend their entire day inside. If you plan to leave them outside during the day, you can reduce the space to some extent. You must ensure sufficient height of roofing.

This will not only ensure proper ventilation but also ensure easy cleaning. A spacious coop will ensure that your chickens remain free from suffocation and diseases. Keep few windows in the coop to allow sufficient sunlight inside the room. You should also provide some artificial lighting as this will ensure proper growth of chickens. Another idea would be to build a outdoor storage shed to house your chickens.

Material of the coop floor.

You should locate your pen some distance above the ground (two to three feet). Keeping it on ground will lead to the accumulation of water and may lead to diseases in your chickens. Use coarse material for the house flooring. Wood is the best option for the house flooring. You should also spread small amounts of food grade diatomaceous earth on the house floor to keep away mites and make your cleaning process easy.

Chicken house nest.

Many people are confused on how to build the house nest. You should keep multiple nests depending on the hen in the house. A 3 side folded nest is best for hens to lay their eggs. If you want fiber or metallic containers, then you should cut them from one side to allow hen to enter the nest area.

Portable Chicken Coop Plans.

Portable chicken coops are lightweight structures, which allow people to relocate them without any difficulty to any part of their house. Some coops have small wheels that are put on them as per the plans. Another reason for opting for portable pen is to allow your chickens to have new grass and insects every few days that allows them to stay healthy.

Portable coops are eco-friendly as having the ability to move allows grass to grow back once chickens have finished grazing on it. This helps in keeping your yard in best shape and also allows your birds to eat fresh food which is lot healthier for them.

Easy D.I.Y. Chicken Coop Plans.

The local dogs and cats in your neighborhood may pose threat to your chickens. Depending upon the area you live, there can be threat even from foxes and badgers, and various other predators. For this reason, a portable  coop is best because you can keep it in your line of sight. 

Another benefit of a portable pen is on the improved quality of meat and eggs that your chickens will produce. Allowing your chickens to roam freely while consuming insects and grass that is fresh is best way to treat your chickens if you consume their eggs and meat.

A portable pen requires much less maintenance than a regular poultry coop. They are much easier to clean and it is easy to take care of them. 

How to Build your Own Chicken Coop.

Thinking how to build your own coop? Well, then you'd need few chicken coop plans that provide you details of the required materials and their dimensions to get started. The biggest consideration for building your chicken coop is space. The more the extra space, the better. Chickens that get extra space perform better than those who live in small cages.

A rule of thumb is to give about three to four square feet of space per bird. Aside from that, your coop should be well ventilated. You should put vents on both the eastern and the southern side of the coop. This will not only supply adequate air, but will also protect your chicken from cold.

If you live in hotter areas, then you should place vents on northern and southern sides where the roofs meet the wall. This will prevent chickens from overheating in summers and freezing in summers. To get your hens used to nesting in boxes, you should put them on floor for first few weeks and then move them about fifteen to twenty inches. To encourage them to lay their eggs in nests, you must ensure that they are in darker areas away from main activity areas.

The last important thing you may need in your pen is a door. Actually your pen should have two doors. A small one for the birds and a big one for humans. This door will allow you to carry supplies such as water and feed. These tips will definitely help you in building an attractive and affordable coop that is healthy and fun to maintain for your chickens to lay eggs comfortably.