Built A Playhouse Coop

[Crazy Maizie]

Red mite trays
If the red mite trays are filled with oil, the chickens are as safe as possible on the roost because the mites cant go back and forth to the coop walls.
The roost must be placed at a good distance from the walls to avoid feather contact with the walls. The trays only work if there is oil in them. By regularly checking the trays for blood lice, you know if there is an infestation in the coop.
I always add ribbed paper rolls under the roosts to check regularly for red mites too.

The link goes to a Dutch site with picture and. description. Weigeren means , I do not accept. cookies: https://dierencompleet.nl/product/olba-anti-bloedluis-kit/
I don’t think they deliver to the US. Maybe Olba or similar is available?

Interesting. I just did a search for the product - tractor supply and Chewy both sell these for those of us in the US.

 

[Vicker]

I'm not that concerned about the space. You said they free-range during the day. I've had a variety of coops over the years for my free-rangers, always trying to provide the recommended amount of roosting space. My flock size tends to run between the upper teens to upper 20s, so that can take some creative engineering. In every case, they choose to crowd up together, leaving unused space.

 

[BDutch]

I'm not that concerned about the space. You said they free-range during the day. I've had a variety of coops over the years for my free-rangers, always trying to provide the recommended amount of roosting space. My flock size tends to run between the upper teens to upper 20s, so that can take some creative engineering. In every case, they choose to crowd up together, leaving unused space.

The necessary size of your coop highly depends on where you live. In a mild climate you need to aim on the roost space (and run space). If you have long and cold winters you need a really large coop with space to scratch and run around.

 

[FinnEllaMom]

Man, the struggle for proper, affordable chicken home is real! After a few weeks of researching options, plans, and seeing how outrageously over priced prefab coops are for what you get, I decided to build one. We'll, mostly build one.

After pricing out materials for the house, it became obvious to me that I could dive well into triple digits for a budget on this. Given that I'm a first time chicken mom, I wasn't even sure these birds were gonna make it. So I compromised:

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After scouring the local marketplace for used playhouses, I came up with nothing so I just bought a new one for about 240 dollars on Amazon. Then I supplemented it with a trip to Home Depot for the run supplies.

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And slowly it started coming to life

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After this pic, I did some heavy coats of weatherproof stain along the inside and some silicone roofing paint on the floor for resilience.
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I had some texturized weather proof deck paint left over from an overlanding project, so I painted the entire run, their ramp, and the base of the coop with it.

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After putting on the shade I added the fans to the inside of the coop and some lighting around the place.

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Seen here under this weekends full moon.
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I have elected to use construction sand throughout the coop and run. It has made life a lot easier and my birds don't have to worry about lounging or running around in soggy ground. Once the inclement weather starts in I'll probably add a full roof over the run. But for now, my birds are happy. It's not very big (12 foot by 4 foot run) but my birds free range in a huge yard all day anyway and they haven't had any trouble finding a place to roost. As of right now they huddle as closely together as they can on one bar.

All in all this project cost me 800 dollars. A prefab coop and run of comparable size would have run me at least 1500 dollars. So, I'm pretty happy. I will probably build off of it as my birds develop their needs. But for now it works just fine.

I'm so glad that you shared this. I have 2 Silkies and they're in need of a new house. My husband was going to build one. But, after seeing this we're going ths route. I think it's gorgeous!