Chickens were the first farm animals introduced to the farm. Our first flock was a barn yard mix of some of the prettiest birds I'd seen. They were all different in color and when they started laying, the eggs were brown, peach, green, blue, and white. I loved it! A couple of dog attacks later, Virgil is the only one left. We replaced our hens with the red ones you see in the photo above. We get 6-8 eggs per day usually.
Come Spring, I plan on building these guys a new coop. I want something pretty and white! Currently our coop was built off of our barn and works just fine, but I intend to use it for meat hens I'm going to start this Spring as well. Here is the current coop:
We were certainly newbies when it came to this. First we secured the coop area, the part under cover of the barn, which is completely secured with 1x1 wire. The run we did by setting 4x4 posts and 2x4 supports, encasing the whole thing with chicken wire. The wire was buried about a foot inside to prevent predators from digging in. We did that right, nothing can get in there! Inside the coop we used closet rod poles attached to the barn with brackets for them to roost on. We converted an old wooden box into nesting boxes. Works nicely.
Here is my inspiration for the new coop I'm planning:
source: Country Living
Hopefully I will be able to accomplish something similar. This is actually quite perfect since we let them out to free range during the day, they just need a cozy little coop and run.
Wishing you a beautiful day! Thanks for stopping by.
Shanna
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