I found a local who is building us a Chicken Coop. I have never owned chickens but have been nerding out on everything I can get my hands on. The coop will be started in about 2 weeks and so I have time to request a change if its needed. I will post pictures below. The breed I have chosen are the Silked Easter Eggers from My Pet Chicken. I purchased 4 baby chicks that ship on Monday next week. I wanted the chance at blue eggs, and the many wonderful traits of a silkie bred with an easter egger. From the description on the website, this breed look to be a little bigger at 3-3.5 lbs. The easter egger in them means they can be more feathered than a traditional silkie.
1) What can I do to the coop to make sure they can easily roost as I have read silkies have a hard time getting up high? I'm hoping the "easter Egger" in them might help them be able to get around better.
2) Is a 6 x 14 foot run big enough as I will NOT be free ranging. I live on 150 acres in the country and we have every predator you can possibly imagine: hawks, owls, raccoon, skunk, copperheads (and other snakes), bobcat, fox, coyote, opossum and mice and rats.
The coop is 6 x 4 and I plan to have him leave out the droppings board as I do not think I will be able to reach in there to clean them without climbing in (ewwww). Is that a mistake? Instead, I plan to just do the entire floor in a deepish layer of granular Sweet PDZ.
For my run, I plan on doing coarse sand mixed with a LOT of Sweet PDZ, 70% sand, 30% granular PDZ. I understand this is expensive to do so. I do not want a smelly coop and I do not believe enough in myself to do a deep litter method properly.
Lastly, we have to prepare the foundation before delivery. We plan on doing a leveled cinder block base 1 course tall with cinder "cap" blocks on top to cover the holes in the block. Inside the rectangle we will put 1/2 hardware cloth,then thick landscaping fabric and then fill with coarse gravel 4-6" deep for drainage and then 6-8" of the sand/PDZ mix.
1) What can I do to the coop to make sure they can easily roost as I have read silkies have a hard time getting up high? I'm hoping the "easter Egger" in them might help them be able to get around better.
2) Is a 6 x 14 foot run big enough as I will NOT be free ranging. I live on 150 acres in the country and we have every predator you can possibly imagine: hawks, owls, raccoon, skunk, copperheads (and other snakes), bobcat, fox, coyote, opossum and mice and rats.
The coop is 6 x 4 and I plan to have him leave out the droppings board as I do not think I will be able to reach in there to clean them without climbing in (ewwww). Is that a mistake? Instead, I plan to just do the entire floor in a deepish layer of granular Sweet PDZ.
For my run, I plan on doing coarse sand mixed with a LOT of Sweet PDZ, 70% sand, 30% granular PDZ. I understand this is expensive to do so. I do not want a smelly coop and I do not believe enough in myself to do a deep litter method properly.
Lastly, we have to prepare the foundation before delivery. We plan on doing a leveled cinder block base 1 course tall with cinder "cap" blocks on top to cover the holes in the block. Inside the rectangle we will put 1/2 hardware cloth,then thick landscaping fabric and then fill with coarse gravel 4-6" deep for drainage and then 6-8" of the sand/PDZ mix.