Chicken House Upgrade Part 1

Hey,
With 12 laying Hens the Chicken House was getting a little cramped. When I first built the place, I had only the 6 Hens I got back in April as day old chicks. I raised them in a brooder up stairs in the house and built a Coop for them and moved them in back in late June/ early July.

And this is what I came up with!. I'm no carpenter and I used what I had on hand to put it together.

As you can see, I used all recycled wood. So the only thing I had to buy were the screws to put all together.

I do a lot of projects using recycled wood. When I lived in the city, I had a two car garage, but never parked the cars in it. No room! With all my wood working tools and wood I had stored in there!! My ex-wife use to complain that I had way too much and never did anything with the wood.
I pick up wood I see that has been set out at curb side.
 And I even have a place that imports material for kitchen counter tops from over seas. It comes in big containers and they use wood to secure it so it does not shift in transit. They normally burn it all, But I got permission to pick Thu it and take what I want.

Here is a side view of the inside. As you can see it's 4 ' wide and about 8 ' long. Not big enough for 12 Chickens!

And here is the wood that will be used to build the new frame work. There is a lot of nail pulling to do before I can use it. But what I will end up with is 8 FT 2" X3"s. And it's the right price......FREE!

If you have read some of the more resent posts, you know that I'm having a work shop built and transported to the Homestead soon (keep my fingers crossed!!!). And a lot of this wood will be use to build shelves and storage bins.

So, the frame work is up and I have to close it up and get a roof on. We have a big storm coming and we are suppose to get heavy rain and high winds this week end. So tomorrow the push will be on to finish this.

Two of the girls decided to supervise the work. That's one of the "Comments" looking over the new floor plan (she seemed to approve). And one of the Leg Horns is back in the right hand corner, She laid an Egg right after I took this picture!

The other thing I want to do is get a set of nesting boxes built and installed too. And get the yard fence up a little higher and covered. I'm not to worried about predators (Have not had a problem with any yet!), But 4 or 5 of the Chicken fly over the top of the fence and are laying all over the yard! I don't think I have found all the Eggs out there!! One of the Leg Horne's is laying her Eggs on the front porch (guess what her name is.....FP for short!).

So if I get it all done tomorrow, I will post pictures of the whole thing. But for now, I will close and If you are on the east coast, BATTEN DOWN THE HATCHES......There is a GULLY WASHER COMING!
Tom