Chicken winter greenhouse

Today I moved the composted leaves, chicken poop and coffee grounds out of the chicken greenhouse and over to the garden to finish cooking for a month.  The big pile of leaves turned into about 4 cubic yards of compost.  Yay!

(It's the bin on the right)

I'm still working on building my chicken winter run. So far, the base of concrete blocks is built, the North wall is up, I scored free doors and windows that I have to refurbish and making good progress on that. Today, I'm hopeful to install the hoops. I have a height problem and I may have to do a double wall on the East because the hoops will not clear the edge of the coop's roof. I had to bust the base to drop the door to ground level
Looks like I have 2 hens brooding but they are confused as to which box they were brooding in: The brood in one for 4-5 days, then switch to another... and another. I can't keep them straight. If the run was built, I might arrange a spot just for them, within view of the others but separated so I'm rushing. That pile of good compost is impressive, Mike!

Great set up mike, next winter I will definitely have a compost coop set up. It just makes too much sense not to.

Thanks Rob!  Now I need to figure out a way to use the compost heat to provide a bit of warmth to the coop...

Mike Haasl wrote:Thanks Rob!  Now I need to figure out a way to use the compost heat to provide a bit of warmth to the coop...

This year, we had here an early frost, cold weather and then wet weather that ruined my plans to pack the winter chicken greenhouse run with leaves. I will have to rely on a transparent film and sunshine to give them some heat. I also have a couple bales of straw that got wet. On the north wall, I am considering stretching a black tarp that would act as a heat sink. It would also be a film to prevent the wood from rotting if I were to place enough compost against it.
I have to clean the coop today. That would also help but I'm not too keen on tossing food over their own litter.

What did you do to fasten the greenhouse portion to the coop in a secure manner? Is the cattle panel structure just fastened to the ground and supports, or is it in any way tied directly to the coop?

The pallets are screwed to the coop.  The row of pallets is tied together along the top with a long 2x4.   The cattle panels are then resting on the pallets and against the 2x4 and screwed down so they stay put.

There are two pseudo-beams on the top that support the cattle panels and force them into the shape I want.  Those two beams are screwed to the coop.  At the lower front edge, the panels just sit on the ground and have some spikes to keep it in place.  I don't think the panel is attached to the coop directly but it surely could be if desired.

Dietrick Klooster wrote:What did you do to fasten the greenhouse portion to the coop in a secure manner? Is the cattle panel structure just fastened to the ground and supports, or is it in any way tied directly to the coop?

It is connected to the coop and that was not my best carpentry work: the trap door connects the 2 buildings: In the long months of winter, they can't go out because of all the snow in the yard. At night, they go back to the coop and roost. The trap door always stays open at night since the 2 buildings are predator proof and mouse-proof [pretty much mouse proof]. In the day, they can drink [heated container in the coop] and forage a bit on the kitchen scraps and germinated grains I bring to them in the greenhouse. It saves me the chore of locking them up at night and releasing them during the day. [I'm working on having a well dug in the greenhouse itself. That would save me having to carry water from the house with a sled and pails! -I'll have to see if that is legal though.
The  connection was built from a hive super that I cut in half and shoved in the side wall of the coop and one of the vertical walls of the greenhouse. The cattle panels go North South and are planted through the top of the wall which is a 6" board on top of a standard wall of 2X4s or stapled with fence riding nails.
I'm not very satisfied with the roof of the coop touching the edge of the greenhouse portion but it works. The edge of the cattle panel against the coop is quite stiff and is fastened solidly to the vertical East and West end walls of the greenhouse, where I have the 2 people doors.
so technically, the greenhouse could stand on its own. The long axis of the coop is at right angle with the long axis of the greenhouse. If it was to be done over, I would have one people door connecting the coop to the greenhouse instead of 2 doors at right angle.
That would have been easier to build and I would have the coop and the greenhouse connecting face to face, although I'm not sure it would be as weather tight as it is.
The plastic sheet that I used to cover the greenhouse has to be rolled up so the chickens can be comfortable when it gets hot. I'm due to let it down for the winter.
I got rid of this batch of chickens so I could do some remodeling inside [and maybe add a hand pump to get them some water in the greenhouse].
I could take some pictures and email them to you from my phone but I have not been able to share pictures on permies. [I'm all thumbs when it comes to doing stuff like that.] maybe you can send me a mooseage?

Mike Haasl wrote:Thanks everyone!  I really like how it's attached to the coop.  Then it's a protected run in the summer if we're gone for a few days (just leave them locked in).  I haven't figured out how to do a full Edible Acres system with feedstock going in and compost coming out.  I'd also have to import a bunch of scraps to make that happen.  I am getting two buckets of food scraps a week that I put in there for the birds to pick over and to turn into compost.  But that's a far cry from what Sean is putting in.

Next year I may try to figure out how to store extra leaf bags.  Then in late winter I can add 40 more bags to make even more compost.

I'm also looking to replicate the system from Edible Acres. The schools in my area started providing all kids with fruits and veggies every day for free, whether they want them or not, so they end up throwing out tons. I already have one small school bringing me some of this waste which is feeding my birds, but I'll be looking to expand it come spring with about 20 birds total.

Thanks for adding more material to the collection on ways to implement this concept.

I joined because of this thread 👍

Wayne Firegarden wrote:I joined because of this thread 👍

Glad you joined us, Wayne. Are you looking to build one or do you have one built already? As you can see in previous post I had the ambition to sink a point in the winter run so I could have water there which presumably would not freeze because this little greenhouse is quite a lot warmer than the outside in winter. The closest source of water is the house, and that is 150 ft away. Not fun in winter!
I gave up on it: One problem was that I could not bring the equipment to *easily* sink a sand point down to water level. The roof is not quite high enough to accommodate the machinery. I used a post hole digger to gain some room, then I started sinking it by hand, with a pounder, but before too long, It just would not go down any more. I may have hit sandstone... It happens...
The other reason is that if I had water running there, it would be quite a lot wetter, Eventually, I think that they would manure badly enough that it might compromise that well. The soil is very sandy [35 ft of sand with first water at 10 ft.] [I'm not sure it would, but how do you reclaim a fouled water aquifer?]
Mike had mentioned making it warmer with a lot of dead leaves that would compost over the winter. I think that is an excellent idea: I "harvested" ["scored" is a better word, I think] just over 100 bags of dead leaves from folks in town that let me have theirs but I figured that my garden had to have first dibs on these leaves. This coming fall, my garden may not be so needy and I will put a few bags in there and hold a few more bags in reserve. The concept is sound, and these leaves will also go in the garden after they've been manured on all winter. Win-Win!

Cécile Stelzer Johnson wrote:

Wayne Firegarden wrote:I joined because of this thread 👍

Glad you joined us, Wayne. Are you looking to build one or do you have one built already? As you can see in previous post I had the ambition to sink a point in the winter run so I could have water there which presumably would not freeze because this little greenhouse is quite a lot warmer than the outside in winter. The closest source of water is the house, and that is 150 ft away. Not fun in winter!
I gave up on it: One problem was that I could not bring the equipment to *easily* sink a sand point down to water level. The roof is not quite high enough to accommodate the machinery. I used a post hole digger to gain some room, then I started sinking it by hand, with a pounder, but before too long, It just would not go down any more. I may have hit sandstone... It happens...
The other reason is that if I had water running there, it would be quite a lot wetter, Eventually, I think that they would manure badly enough that it might compromise that well. The soil is very sandy [35 ft of sand with first water at 10 ft.] [I'm not sure it would, but how do you reclaim a fouled water aquifer?]
Mike had mentioned making it warmer with a lot of dead leaves that would compost over the winter. I think that is an excellent idea: I "harvested" ["scored" is a better word, I think] just over 100 bags of dead leaves from folks in town that let me have theirs but I figured that my garden had to have first dibs on these leaves. This coming fall, my garden may not be so needy and I will put a few bags in there and hold a few more bags in reserve. The concept is sound, and these leaves will also go in the garden after they've been manured on all winter. Win-Win!

You guys have some nice setups from the looks and sounds of them.

Essentially, I was searching to see if anyone else had wrapped their greenhouse in poultry wire and what clips they used to attach the pieces. The zip ties I'm using are starting to be annoying and I want to ensure after summer when I pull the cover, nothin snags it.  

I have a 20x10 that I'm currently securing. One of the searched images led me here. I was able to find some nice stainless fasteners on good ol Amazon.

The original post gave me a lot of ideas of usage with my cinder blocks and leaf collection.

Your sink hole idea idea is nice as well. I wonder if my compost bins would also aid in heat source as well.  

Still laughing at your manure leaf comment 😂