Our new henhouse -- a diary of progress

Well, I've started making real progress on our henhouse that's been in the works for about two years and I decided to start documenting it before it gets out of hand. (I've also never started my own thread at Permies so I figured I ought to get around to doing that.) My intent is to document the build, step by step including my challenges, and at least a ways into keeping chickens for the first time.

I've wanted chickens for a long time but we didn't live somewhere that it was reasonable. But we bought a place 'up north' and started renovations and after ten months, we moved in and sold our exurban residence. All along this process, we were planning for chickens. Even before we had this place, through research, I'd decided on a true deep-litter method and to build a large enough house that the birds could live in it 24x7x365 without it being an abomination. That meant I was going to dig a pretty large pit and build over it. I 'sketched' out where it would be in one place with chunks of bark on the grass and then we changed our mind to place it a little more out of the way. It's going to be tucked behind our garage. In the picture just below, taken from the deck outside our kitchen (frontish) door, the coop will be around the left corner of the garage and past that white spruce.

Looking forward to seeing the build.  What kind of coop are you building?  For our climate, I would be very cognizant of two things.  Good ventilation and no drafts at all where the chicken will roost or nest.  Can't wait to see your progress!

Around late June of last year (2021) I was finally out from under the planting and gardening chores as well as home-renovation tasks that take up a lot of spare time and I decided to attack the coop. I screwed a bunch of (non-permie) treated-for-ground-contact 4x4s together to form a floating foundation on which I could build, moved that into place, and contemplated the pit. I got a couple shovels out and started digging. I discovered, that even with our sandy loam, digging is a lot of work. I ended up deciding this was going to take one fat guy with a shovel, literally years just to dig the pit. I wish I'd taken a picture of the hole before I hired in an excavator, but I don't seem to have one.

So, an excavator it was!

With the owner-operator, it cost something like $400 and took about two hours. I could have rented a smaller unit and done it myself but it would have cost more, taken more time, and I would have done a poorer job, but at least I'd have learned to operate the machine. It mostly came down to not having a truck and trailer. Anyway, here's some documentation of that process:



 

Once the excavator was done, I had some shovel-work to convert the rounded corners it left to sharper cut-offs, but that wasn't too bad.

And then I started thinking about how to level things. Before I could jump down into the pit, the foundation sitting on grade seemed pretty level. But once I could, it was obviously horrible. And my four-foot level wasn't all that useful because of the rough work I did with the 4x4s in the foundation. So I started propping the wood foundation up on concrete blocks. But I couldn't get things even and in order to dig out a little, I had to lever the foundation up and I kind of got discouraged.

Around that same time, I found this thread, where Trace convinced me to change directions. But I had the foundation and the pit and I was dedicated to using them, so I couldn't just adopt exactly one of the designs included in Woods' book.

I kind of sat on things, mulling over how to do what I wanted, until this spring when I revisited the pit and started wondering about shoring up the sandy walls that were crumbling. I decided that I need to build something sturdy around the perimeter and it came down to treated plywood or concrete block. I also settled on corner posts sunk into dug holes and set on large flagstones, with concrete block in-fill to keep the foundation level. I don't love all these decisions, but I'm using vernacular design and construction skills and have problems to solve as I go.

My brother in law is about fifteen years younger than my wife and a carpenter. He lives a ten hour drive south of us, but he came up last Saturday and is leaving later today. We got some work done and I've learned quite a lot! We're trying to get enough done that I have all the basic skills to continue the job without him.

A side note on the economics: I spent about $1000 two years ago, luckily before the price of wood skyrocketed, on supplies, about half of which we're not using because I didn't know what I was doing. I've spent another $1200 on stuff while Paul's been up helping me. I mentioned that the excavation was about $400. (I'm glad that I was able to stretch these expenses out over time!) And I don't think I'll need much else -- some drip-edge is the only thing I know of for sure. I had all the tools I need. So maybe I'd say this has been about $2100 and a savvy builder/shopper could probably have saved some. Also, roughly $160 was delivery fees that someone with a truck and trailer could have avoided.

Trace Oswald wrote:For our climate, I would be very cognizant of two things.  Good ventilation and no drafts at all where the chicken will roost or nest.  Can't wait to see your progress!

We're cladding the walls in OSB and wrapping in off-brand Tyvek to halt drafts. My preliminary designs says that short wall will be entirely open. (I mean, screened with hardware cloth). But I'm trying to make everything other than the front opening tight. I hadn't planned on Tyvek, just paint and caulk, but Paul convinced me.

The footprint is about 14' wide by 16.5' long. It's not as long and thin as I'd prefer, but I'm hoping it works. If there's too much open at the front, I can end up sheathing over the outside edges of that wall.

Christopher Weeks wrote:

Trace Oswald wrote:For our climate, I would be very cognizant of two things.  Good ventilation and no drafts at all where the chicken will roost or nest.  Can't wait to see your progress!

We're cladding the walls in OSB and wrapping in off-brand Tyvek to halt drafts. My preliminary designs says that short wall will be entirely open. (I mean, screened with hardware cloth). But I'm trying to make everything other than the front opening tight. I hadn't planned on Tyvek, just paint and caulk, but Paul convinced me.

The footprint is about 14' wide by 16.5' long. It's not as long and thin as I'd prefer, but I'm hoping it works. If there's too much open at the front, I can end up sheathing over the outside edges of that wall.

It looks great.  I think the Tyvek is a great idea.  If you can work it in, I would put vents on either side near the top.  The slope of the roof may cause heat issues in the high area in summer.  Window glass is very cold to sit in front of, but you could make a simple piece of siding to fit over the vent holes with some overlap and a couple hings.  A little weather stripping would kill any drafts.  Just a thought.  

Trace Oswald wrote:If you can work it in, I would put vents on either side near the top....you could make a simple piece of siding to fit over the vent holes with some overlap and a couple hings.  A little weather stripping would kill any drafts.  Just a thought.  

Just to be sure I'm on the same page with you, you're suggesting a screened window that I open for the summer and plug up for the winter. Yeah?

I've been wondering about stuff like this since most of the online advice for coop-builders (from people to our south) is that you can't have enough ventilation.

Christopher Weeks wrote:

Trace Oswald wrote:If you can work it in, I would put vents on either side near the top....you could make a simple piece of siding to fit over the vent holes with some overlap and a couple hings.  A little weather stripping would kill any drafts.  Just a thought.  

Just to be sure I'm on the same page with you, you're suggesting a screened window that I open for the summer and plug up for the winter. Yeah?

I've been wondering about stuff like this since most of the online advice for coop-builders (from people to our south) is that you can't have enough ventilation.

That is exactly how I would do it.  I would use hardware cloth since it's very sturdy against predator attacks, and then just swing a hinged piece of siding down over the vent for winter.  I agree with people that say more ventilation is better.  My birds are much healthier and happier now that they have a lot more fresh air.  Good ventilation and your deep litter floor should make very healthy chickens.  As I mentioned in a post somewhere, I never water the chickens in the coop in the winter either.  My goal is for the coop to be bone dry in winter.   In summer with all the vents open, watering in the coop seems to be fine if you find that is easier.

Keep in mind, I'm no expert, just a guy that wants to have happy, healthy chickens.  I think your coop is going to work great.  Any idea how many birds you will keep?

Trace Oswald wrote:Any idea how many birds you will keep?

My initial intent is to purchase around 20 Icelandic landrace chickens but they're unsexed, so should be roughly 10 hens. I'll probably buy a very small number of other winter-hardy varieties to mix in year to year, but I'd like to let the birds make new birds. I don't really know what predator pressure is going to be like and how many I should expect to lose and need to replace. I'm not planning for a run of any kind and will start out free-ranging them when the weather is nice, but I won't need to. All these details are flexible.

I haven't tried Icelandic chickens yet, but I hope to sometime.  I'm picking up 12 hatching eggs for Russian Orloffs in a week.  It will be my first time trying those as well.  I just got 6 Turkens and 4 Partridge Rocks a little while ago.  Turkens are really wonderful birds if you have never tried them.

If I'm successful in hatching the Orloffs, I'm sure to have roosters as well.  I would be happy to trace an Orloff or two for Icelandic roosters if you would be interested.  If you are planning to keep a specific breed, I understand that as well.  I like to have a bunch of mixed breeds chickens around because I find them interesting and you end up with some really fascinating looking chickens.

Yeah, if that works out, that sounds fun. I'm not interested in breed-purity in any of the organisms I care for. I'd rather squeeze out all the hybrid-vigor I can. I've read about systems where some number of chicken-keepers form a group and every year, each passes a young rooster to the "left" so that everyone is drawing on a broader gene-pool without having to keep a huge flock. I have the sense that that's an old-timey practice but it sounds smart to me.

Well, my helper/mentor left and I had other priorities and then it got hot and before I knew it, almost three weeks had passed with no progress. But I got the second flying rafter and the down-slope fascia on and the boards trimmed up. Next priority is to sheath and surface the roof before weather turns cold.

Christopher, you are building a chicken castle ❤
Just a friendly piece of advice: do not let perfect be the enemy of good.
Chicken pee and shit all over the place. They peck at everything. It is never going to be a beautiful, fragant abode 😄.
But I adore what you have done!!

While I'm not quite in zone 3b, I kept chickens through the polar vortex a few years ago, and we get pretty low wind chills off of Lake Michigan, plus a couple hefty hauls of lake-effect snow each winter. While I don't mean to knock anything you are doing, in any way, shape or form, I suspect you may be overbuilding by a good margin. My chickens have been completely free range in the woods around my house for at least 3 years now. they come back to their coop most of the time at night, which could be described as the worst shed you've ever seen, with two feet of hardware cloth between the top of the walls and the roof. I built it that way to ensure ventilation above all else.

In the 3 or 4 years since I built this coop, I have lost birds to predators, but not had a single sick one, nor any frostbitten combs. As long as you get the appropriate breeds, chickens are very hardy creatures. Believe it or not, the past 2 or 3 winters we've had a hen hatch chicks sometime between December and February, with no real issues.

Best of luck on the rest of the build, and with your chickening adventures to come!

Christopher Weeks wrote:Well, my helper/mentor left and I had other priorities and then it got hot and before I knew it, almost three weeks had passed with no progress. But I got the second flying rafter and the down-slope fascia on and the boards trimmed up. Next priority is to sheath and surface the roof before weather turns cold.

any updates.?

Gierlothnir Wodanson wrote:any updates.?

I’m afraid not. We’ve been under several feet of snow for a few months so no construction has gotten done. Hopefully I’ll be able to restart next month.

Christopher Weeks wrote:

Gierlothnir Wodanson wrote:any updates.?

I’m afraid not. We’ve been under several feet of snow for a few months so no construction has gotten done. Hopefully I’ll be able to restart next month.

That’s completely understandable. I’m anxious to see it finished

I am too — I’ve been waiting twenty five years to have a flock!