Doubled our budget and tripled our timeline, but I’m so excited with how it turned out!

Well, the coop I built survived a mudslide and the chickens are all healthy. They turned into mud balls for a few hours but I have them foraging in the backyard now.

Found this squatter with a full belly in my coop. Jokes on him. After I evicted him, I noticed one of my ceramic eggs missing. Someone's going to have a rough afternoon. My coop is elevated by 3 feet with the only access being the auto chicken door that's only open during the day. Any idea how to prevent future Interlopers? Also, what kind of snake am I looking at?

Obviously there’s trash and some serious cleaning to do, but overall this coop is in pretty good shape! Some wiring and wood to fix and netting to put up for a run, but my plan is to (wear a mask and gloves) and clean and fix over the winter for a springtime start to my flock. With the bird flu stuff happening, is that still a good idea? I guess I’m just looking for some pointers/encouragement as this has been a dream of mine for a while and I’ve been researching a lot to be the best chicken owner I can! We would be getting chickens for eggs not meat

We have a colony of probably 10 or so rats around here (we can tell them apart since they’re all different sizes). They go in our chicken run and eat the leftovers at night that are on the ground even though we feed our chickens exactly half a cup each, they run right over our feet, fall in the chickens water buckets, and a couple days ago I went out to get my solitary elder hen in bed (she acts like other birds are gonna kill her so she has her own run and a blocked off nesting box) and there was a rat in there with her eating the food. She’s frail enough as is I don’t need a rat getting her sick. The rats avoid hate boxes and regular snapping traps. They live in our compost bin and have tunnels under it. They chew through our chicken feed bins even shooting them doesn’t work (we can’t use a super strong gun because we’re next to a road and there’s gun laws around here). No matter how much we animal proof they find a way and they avoid the traps. So what traps might finally get them? We can’t just spread rat poison because we have dogs cats and chickens that we don’t want getting it. And we’ve also had rats die in our ceiling and we can’t get them so I’d like to not use that. Also not looking to get another animal since the dog and rabbit have high vet bills and I don’t think a barn cat could get these rats and I don’t want another outdoor cat since it’s not a great area for them

My three silkies don’t like to go up the stairs. They never go up on their own to sleep or lay eggs… I have three. They also have space outside on the grass during the day. I’ve tried treats on the stairs and nudging them, but nothing works. Is it too steep? Do I need to raise the steps or put more steps in between? Please help me…

Hi! I have a 2500 sq ft chicken coop that needs something to protect the little ones from hawks. I was considering nylon netting for berry bushes, and hang that across the entire run.

Any advice on what I can put up to fend then off?

My parents are trying to tell me I need to put a heat lamp in my coop, or at least in the enclosure. But I've seen so many people on here say they don't need a heat lamp so I'm conflicted. My chickens are pets to me so I'm terrified at the thought of losing my babies. I have 2 silkies, an ayam cemani, an americauna, and a brahma.

The way we've winterized it theres no chance of snow getting in unless it comes thru the door or of the roof collapses. But to be fair at that point I've got bigger problems. Anyways check out my setup and tell me what you think, this is my first winter with them so it's a learning experience.

We bought a coop online, was advertised for 12 chickens and was $1200. Well, let me tell you, once our 6 chickens are fully grown it will definitely not be big enough for them (they’re 5 weeks old right now.)

It’s only me and my mom, and neither of us know anything about building, like, at all. We could barely put together my bed we bought on Wayfair, and we did it wrong.

We went to a local place to look at chicken coops they had, and they were $8,000 dollars for the smaller model. $8,000. How did y’all end up getting your coops without financially crippling yourselves?

Any advice is appreciated, even if it’s calling me stupid lol.

Edit: Thank y’all so much for all the feedback! I am most likely going to attempt to convert a shed. I was hoping someone knew of somewhere online that was cheaper/higher quality, but I now realize building stuff doesn’t have to be horribly difficult. Y’all have definitely given me more confidence lol.

First of all hello, I’m Jack and I’m new to raising chickens. I understand that they like to nest together on top of things but I don’t know what’s wrong with the nesting box we made for them. The way they’re trying to sleep on top of the box looks very uncomfortable and they won’t even enter the box when I put mealworms in there. I would love to hear any suggestions on how I can help these little guys. Any help is much appreciated.

My first 6 chicks still have another 3 or so weeks before they come out to the coop and 6 weeks for my other 4. I bought this from tractor supply and I know it’s not going to be big enough for 10. My thoughts were to atleast put two long ways roosting bars in here. One where I’m holding it and another across the middle of the dropping shelf.

but how much overhead does a chicken need to roost up there? I would also have to cover the nesting boxes to avoid them getting pooped on. Eventually I want to expand the coop out sideways but as for the best solution for now I think this is it. I worry I would also make the nesting boxes too small.

As promised, an update on our chicken Paradise.

We are still far from finished, but have come a long way since the parking space it was (check my previous posts)

Ill continue to update as we het closer to the end.

Hi all, We’re in So Cal and the fires are bad enough we just got an evacuation warning. We don’t have to leave yet, but we don’t have a plan for where to put the chickens or what to do. My aunt has several chickens of her own, but we bought a much bigger breed. Space would be tight if we put them all in the same coop/run. So what do we do?

ETA: Thank you everyone for your ideas and suggestions!! We finally got ahold of the local animal shelter that’s taking animals from the fire. They don’t currently have any chickens and said they’re very confident there will be space for our girls. We have learned that we definitely did not do our due diligence to be ready in case of an emergency, but feel like we are in a good spot to be able to evacuate our girls safely

But really, it's a Chevy Blazer that I'm using to move my chickens from CA to Va

My 11-year-old and I will be doubling the size of our chicken run to better accommodate our growing flock. We currently keep the chickens in the run until they are let out to free range at 8 a.m. each day. What started as a flock of 10 birds has grown to 52, and the run is starting to feel a bit cramped. To address this, we plan to expand the run to 1,200 square feet, which we hope will provide plenty of breathing room—especially on rainy days when they aren't able to free range.

Happy new year everyone!

We just moved to our (hopefully) forever home, and this greenhouse was built by the previous owner. 3 of the glass windows are broken, and it got me thinking that maybe it could make a great coop?

I'm in the Mojave desert where summers are VERY hot and the winters can get down to about 10 degrees F at night.

I definitely want to build an open air coop/run for ventilation, so I thought maybe replacing the broken windows with hardware cloth and adding on a run from one of the windows.

With both temp extremes, I need airy, shaded, and also the potential to shield against very strong wind storms we get. This structure is very solid.

I would love any and all suggestions!! My dream of chicken keeping is soon to become a reality and I want to make sure I'm doing it right. Thank you in advance. 💜

I've posted before about my chickens but I don't remember if it was on this sub. I have a coop but it's been faulty and I'm looking for ways to keep my Reggie and the girls safe. Should we get more heating lamps? Should I insulate the coop better? What can I do? If anything, I'm worried about their water. I've been told that beet juice can help stop it from freezing and something about a bottle filled with salt water but I don't know. We do have a heat lamp inside the coop where they roost and brood but I don't think it's going to be enough. I don't want to lose my flock. I love them and they are my responsibility. I raised them and they depend on me in their own way. Any advice is welcomed.

I have heard mixed opinions on cedar and sand and other options.

What do you use and why?

We live in a colder climate as well so we’ve always used cedar but I feel there may be other options that are easier to clean lol.