The Eagles (Chickens) Have Landed!

I know it's been a while since my last post. Getting the coop finished took a bit longer than expected, but we finally finished it and moved our newest family members into their sweet digs yesterday. In case you are wondering, Alton found plans for the coop here: http://poultry.purinamills.com/stellent/groups/public/documents/web_content/ecmd0007989.pdf and modified the plan to be warm-weather friendly by making two of the sides out of mesh rather than solid panels. He also built a single-level roost out of 2x4s instead of the three-level roost made of dowels that the plan suggested. We also embellished it with a decorative sign. (Pretty much my only contribution to this project besides a wee bit of the painting.) We're really pleased with the result and the ladies seem to be enjoying it so far as well.

So instead of a long how-it-was-made narrative, I'll let these photos tell the story:

The first batch of materials. We brought the metal roofing back and went with shingles.

Ready to get started - the materials are all laid out on the patio, I mean Alton's workshop.

Things are starting to take shape. We changed the solid floor to 1/2 inch mesh later.

This is the front with a hole cut out for the egg box (top) and door.

The back. We cut a big square out to make a door so we can easily get in there to clean and refill the chickens' food and water.

Here you can see where we took down the sides and the floor to replace with mesh. I was concerned about them walking on the mesh, but once they are big enough to roost they will stay either on their 2x4 perch or in the egg box. For now we have a piece of cardboard down for them to walk on.

The roof goes on!

The perch goes in!

Front door.

Back door.

Egg box.

Interior view taken from the back. they have the 2x4 perch as well as a little perch to help them into the egg box. We borrowed my dad's old shovel and broke the handle, so it was repurposed as a mini perch. (Don't worry, the shovel was already cracked and super old - we aren't that tough on yardcare equipment. I hope.)

Shingling begins. (Also, "shingling" is a fun word. Go ahead. Say it.)

Shingling is complete!

We decided to paint it a nice barn red.

We named it The Lucky Rooster Saloon because of the three lovely ladies who live here.

And here's the finished product in our backyard.

And that's our coop. The next project we need to do is enclose our patio so that the chickens don't get up there and poop all over it or cross it to get out of the yard.

And now for some photos of our new babies. Oh, I explained the names in my last post. We decided that the white chick is RZR, the black chick is Scooter, and the brown chick is Rickshaw McGraw.