The last time I wrote a post about our chickens was how we were building a cheap fence for them and temporarily moving them into a converted doghouse until we had time to build something more permanent as well as larger.
Several months ago before the cold weather really set in we finally got around to making them something. It took a bit of head scratching and to be honest some good natured arguing to come up with a plan that was not only cheap, but met the cities requirements for housing chickens in city limits.
We knew we didn't want to invest a ton of money into the project, but we still wanted something that would protect them from the elements.
Our solution was to convert part of our current shed into a makeshift chicken coop. The girls have been in it for around 2 months now and they love it. We love it as well because it is easy to access the eggs and did not take up anymore space in our yard.
One of our biggest dilemmas was how to cheaply make nesting boxes that would fit in the shed. I watch watching some youtube videos by Becky's Homestead when I saw her describe these nest boxes. (If you need some beginner homestead tips check out Becky's youtube channel. Her voice is really annoying, but she has some good advice)
The idea could not be easier. All I had to do was buy 3 storage totes at Walmart and cut a chicken size hole it in.
The above picture is of the girls getting acquainted with the new boxes. They were quite curious. At the time I only knew of one chicken that was laying. That's probably her getting ready to head in.
The reason I love these boxes so much is that all you have to do is lift the lid off and get your eggs. I was so excited about discovering this super simple nest box. And the chickens LOVE it!
The next step was to figure out how to divide the inside of the shed into a storage side as well as a chicken side and still be able to access both sides without disturbing the other side.
Our solution was to use more of the bamboo poles we had left over from building the chicken fence and make one inside the shed.
To build the divider we zip tied 4 poles to the frame of the shed ceiling and then zip tied the chicken wire to the poles to create a fence.
Have I ever told you how much I love zip ties? They are useful for so many things. Lately I have been using them to keep the 1 yr old I babysit out of my kitchen cabinets.
With the bottom of the fence open we can pull the nest boxes out and slide the pole over to the side if we need to access the chicken side to clean or feed.
I am sure you can see there are some gaps between the boxes. The chickens are a bit too large to fit through them, but to be sure we blocked them off with items stores in the shed such as the bag of peat moss in the photo.
Now that it is winter I have taken out the wood chips and put in lots of hay for them to build nests and sleep in at night. I am anxious to scoop everything off the floor of the coop in the spring to add to the garden as compost.
I am a bit concerned about how the concrete floor of the shed will hold up to having chicken poo and hay on it all the time. Hopefully it will be ok.
The last step was to add a door for the chickens. We built the interior fence so that it does not interfere with the sheds door, but that also meant the chickens could not get in.
This step made us cringe a bit, but the only solution we could come up with was to cut a hole in the side of the shed. We looked at adding a doggy door that we could close up at night, but that was too expensive. Instead we can just stick a large board in front of it at night for now.
In total I think the only thing I had to buy was the hay and storage boxes. Everything else we already had. I think with the supplies we bought I spend around $25-$30! That is so much better then the cheaply built coops we were looking at that were in the $300-400 range.
There you have it folks, a cheap and useful coop.
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