Chicken House Plans

Chicken House Plans

How to build a chicken coop

What a great hobby!  And, I figured if my nephew Michael in Austin knows how to build a chicken coop, then I could learn too.  His kids enjoy having a backyard barnyard and working with animals is a super learning experience.  I recommend getting backyard chickens to everyone who can, but especially for families with young kids.  Yep, it’s one of those good family activities and your kids will be the envy of the neighborhood.

In Austin?  Yes, there apparently is no ordinance against it in many cities, but there may be  some restrictions you need to be aware in your location such as:

1. No crowing roosters
2. Chickens must stay in their own backyard
3. No public health nuisance
4. No mess, and no bothering others.

You’ll have to check all your local laws and ordinances where you live.  Since I live out in the country, I had no worries about planning the size of our flock or the design of the chicken coop…..or even a loud mouthed rooster. Yes, I have three of them.  They try to outcrow one another and sometimes it’s really funny. Here’s our chicken coop out here in Sherwood.

If you’re looking to build a chicken coop, there are some important things that you must consider before doing so. Lots of  people just jump right into the building process without using chicken house plans and end up neglecting certain aspects which really cost them a lot of time and money in the long run.  If I had these plans to start with, I would have done a few things differently than when I built my first chicken coop.

Click Here! to get great chicken house plans

I recently built on to our existing chicken house using these very easy chicken house plans.  I modified them a little bit to fit my own situation and it came out looking great.

By keeping the following building tips in mind, you’ll  be making all the right decisions when it comes time to building your coop.

Here’s some things you need to know about chicken house plans:

How many chickens?

The first thing to keep in mind as you learn more about how to build a chicken coop is how many chickens you plan to have. You are going to need a much larger chicken house if you want to raise 10 or more birds compared to if you only want two to three.

Making sure the size of chicken coop you choose is correct is important otherwise your chickens are not going to produce quality eggs.

Consider Your Climate

That was a major consideration for us since we live in hot West Texas. What type of temperatures do you typically experience both summer and winter? Also,  how much rain do you get?  The first winter we had chickens, Ramona put a heat lamp out in the pen to keep them warm.  As we got a little more experience under our belts, we quickly learned that most chickens don’t mind the cold at all.  It’s the heat they can’t stand.  Makes sense huh?  Shouldn’t we have known feathers make for good insulation?

Do you want a movable coop?

Some backyard farmers want a coop they can move around the yard so that great fertilizer can be deposited all around.  Also, chickens do eat the foliage and bugs so a movable coop works good in some areas.  You can consider whether you want to have a mobile chicken coop. You might like being able to move your chicken house around either for cleaning purposes or just because you want to watch your chickens when you are inside the home by putting the coop within view of a window or kitchen.   Putting the coop near a window to be able to see them work is entertaining.  Mobile designs typically work best when you have a smaller number of chickens due to the fact larger houses are heavier and thus  harder to transport around.

What is your budget?

Cost is always an important factor for most of us.   When you use these  chicken house plans there are different things you can do to keep your costs low if you are on a limited budget. In some cases, if you know a few quick and easy tricks you might even be able to build a chicken coop for free.  We always promote recycling.   It’s all about understanding what types of materials can be used and then figuring the cost of building and purchasing those materials if necessary.

So, keep these chicken house building tips in mind. If you do some reading first before getting started, you will definitely cut your total costs down.