Chicken Palace

[Chicken Cat]

Heyo again!

First time chicken lady making new posts less than a minute after joining here! Hoping to get some info, ideas and be told how unreasonable I am!

The business:
I have bought a prefab coop (below) for my first flock of chickens, and I am going to Frankenstein it until it fits my very specific requirements. I want 6 chickens. I will do what I must to get 6 chickens. I want to add an ft extension to the run and put a little roof coop on top. The roof coop could be like the picture below, or just a 2x2-2x3 triangle with a floor door. I made a few plans to help me visualize, but I'm not sure which I want. I'm trying to keep the footprint small as I'm going to put wheels on it and move it around the yard with a tractor. Is this feasible?

I want to make a McMansion for my McChickens. Any thoughts, advice, and criticism is welcome!

 

[KyCoop]

OK well I'll go first. A prefab will never be a McMansion. The coop itself is way too small for 6 full grown hens. I know it says on the box it will hold 6 chickens but can't be more untrue.
The tractor idea is great but I'm afraid all the upgrades and expansions will make it immovable. Maybe someone with tractor experience can weigh in.

 

[rosemarythyme]

Little confused by the diagrams, especially since there's no measurements listed. I do agree that the coop shown appears to be too small for 6 adult birds, looks maybe 3x3 at most (not counting nests)?

Cobbling together several sections of coop and run would likely make for a structure too unstable to move. Tractors are generally built as a single unit to provide the stability needed to allow it to be moved around.

 

[Chicken Cat]

OK well I'll go first. A prefab will never be a McMansion. The coop itself is way too small for 6 full grown hens. I know it says on the box it will hold 6 chickens but can't be more untrue.
The tractor idea is great but I'm afraid all the upgrades and expansions will make it immovable. Maybe someone with tractor experience can weigh in.

Oh right! Sorry, forgot to mention all of it will be on a metal frame with wheels for stability. My dad also said with some brackets it should be stable enough (he works at Lowe's, so I guess I'll trust him lol). I'm disabled, so it's easier for me to use premade pieces (like a model, but bigger ). I started with this prefab because its frame is also metal and I could get some starting measurements to work with.

Maybe it could be McMiddle Class? To be honest, I originally wanted 4 chickens, but one of them is from another flock and well... I didn't want her to be lonely

 

[Chicken Cat]

Little confused by the diagrams, especially since there's no measurements listed. I do agree that the coop shown appears to be too small for 6 adult birds, looks maybe 3x3 at most (not counting nests)?

Cobbling together several sections of coop and run would likely make for a structure too unstable to move. Tractors are generally built as a single unit to provide the stability needed to allow it to be moved around.

[UPDATE] I'm so sorry! I did the math wrong! I updated this comment with the correct size. I forgot about the nesting box when calculating. I attached proper scaled plans as well, and a pic of the tractor.


Right sorry! I've been staring at it so long I forgot other people don't know the measurements. Also the diagrams aren't scaled, they're more for placement purposes and for the frame.

To clarify, all the pieces are going to sit on a solid frame with wheels for the tractor to pull. The diagrams were so I could see the shape of it. I'm gonna use some big boy brackets to secure the pieces. Due to circumstances, I can't build from the ground up on location, so I have to make it in pieces and assemble it there. Hence, all the pieces need to be able to fit in the bed of a pickup truck basically I'm building this like a model kit but bigger.

The prefab has a 3'x3' run (not counting the space under the coop), the coop is 3'x3', and the nesting box is 1'x3'. So I'd need a 6'x4' frame.

In the first diagram, I added a 3'x3' box to extend the run and a 2'x3' coop. The idea is there will be a door in between the extender and the prefab run so if need be I can separate the coops. One side will have an original coop and a 3'x3' run, and the other with have the original run and a 2'x3' coop. So, a 5'x9' frame.

In the second diagram I just slapped a 3'x3' box on the end of it and put a 3'x3' coop on the top . So a 9'x4' frame.

So the total area for each one including the space under the coops and the nesting box are:

12sqft of coop and 21qft of run space for the prefab

18sqft coop and 36sqft run space for diagram 1

21sqft coop and 29 sqft run for diagram 2

I may extend the coop to cover the original run in diagram 1, which would give me 27sqft of coop space, but would also look weird as hell lol.

I suppose the simple answer would be to simply stick two prefabs together and make the coop bigger, but where's the fun in that?

 

[Labsandchickens8]

OK well I'll go first. A prefab will never be a McMansion. The coop itself is way too small for 6 full grown hens. I know it says on the box it will hold 6 chickens but can't be more untrue.
The tractor idea is great but I'm afraid all the upgrades and expansions will make it immovable. Maybe someone with tractor experience can weigh in.

Couldn't agree more with the size issue. I'm also a newbie who had wanted chickens forever, so finally my sons bought me one from Amazon and built a run. I bought 3 pullets and immediately chicken math hit, requiring me to get 7 chicks. And I discovered how absolutely terrible that coop was to deal with. Long story short, my husband and I built a beautiful coop for roosting only and I use the original coop for nesting boxes. And they love to sit on top of it. That's all it's good for.
We had to add an extension to the original run, known as the Annex, so I can stand up when cleaning out my beautiful coop. Then I added added a foyer to the front with another gate so they can't escape when I bring treats (they charge the gate when they see me.) And I am planning on building tunnels so they can get put in the yard somewhat safely. Maybe you could build movable tunnels and a decent sized, easily cleanable coop. I had to learn everything the hard way and do everything after the fact.

 

[Chicken Cat]

Couldn't agree more with the size issue. I'm also a newbie who had wanted chickens forever, so finally my sons bought me one from Amazon and built a run. I bought 3 pullets and immediately chicken math hit, requiring me to get 7 chicks. And I discovered how absolutely terrible that coop was to deal with. Long story short, my husband and I built a beautiful coop for roosting only and I use the original coop for nesting boxes. And they love to sit on top of it. That's all it's good for.
We had to add an extension to the original run, known as the Annex, so I can stand up when cleaning out my beautiful coop. Then I added added a foyer to the front with another gate so they can't escape when I bring treats (they charge the gate when they see me.) And I am planning on building tunnels so they can get put in the yard somewhat safely. Maybe you could build movable tunnels and a decent sized, easily cleanable coop. I had to learn everything the hard way and do everything after the fact.

Yeah I originally bought this coop with plans for 4 chickens, but I was getting 3 chickens from one flock and 1 from the other, and I heard it's not good to introduce chickens alone... so here we are. I could do 5 chickens

I'd love to see pictures of your coop!

 

[Labsandchickens8]

This is the nesting box/perching on top of house from Amazon that was completely unworkable as an actual coop. That's 3 of my girls looking in to see why the crazy broody Polish hen won't allow anyone else to come in. Sigh . . . Chicken drama.

 

[Chicken Cat]

View attachment 4084311This is the nesting box/perching on top of house from Amazon that was completely unworkable as an actual coop. That's 3 of my girls looking in to see why the crazy broody Polish hen won't allow anyone else to come in. Sigh . . . Chicken drama.

Oh wow, that is small. Bet it works great for broody hens though! Your girls are probably wondering why she wants to be in chicken prison.

 

[rosemarythyme]

I suppose the simple answer would be to simply stick two prefabs together and make the coop bigger, but where's the fun in that?

Here's the reality though. They might use 2 coops. They'll more likely all cram into one regardless if they comfortably fit or not. So I don't quite understand this layout with 2 coops and then a run sort of connecting them - if the overall frame is going to be 9x4 or 9x5, why not make it a single rectangle with a single larger coop (or just roosts, if your climate can support an open air set up) on one end?

Here's another reality - pecking order dictates that low ranked birds should respect a higher ranked bird's personal space, which is like a bubble around 4-5' wide. If the set up is more narrow than that (and currently all versions you've posted are only 3' wide in the run) it's more difficult for low ranked birds to safely walk past each other without setting off a chase.