Calling all chicken people!!!! LOL!!

[jacks'thunder]

Could you please show me pictures of your set ups? Your fencing, coop, nesting boxes, stuff like that! I have a happy little bunch of 11 girls but I just aquired 12 more and I'm not sure how much room I need for all of them to be happy. My original girls have a wall mounted unit thats metal with 3 rows and 8(I think???) nesting holes in each row. But now I have all these new girls and I'd like to build some new boxes in a different part of my coop for them. I have a huge coop and it's split in half so new girls and old girls are seperate(sp?) right now, but I'd like to eventually put everyone together. Any helpful tips tricks stuff like that would be great!

Thanks a million!!

Leya

 

[Shari]

Mine is useable but the ugliest coop you will ever see.

I have 4 large nest boxes for them but they all seem to want to use the same one.

I have 8 bantams and down to two large hens.

I would just make the same amount of nest boxes again, that way you will have double the amount. That should be fine for the number of hens you have.

I really miss the 12' by 18' Hen house we had at the old farm. Metal studs, 1/2 by 1/2" hardware cloth over that, then the 1/2 siding on top of it all. Painted nicely. Rats, mice and so on couldn't get in! They were always locked in during the night.

Then our chicken yard (for the rare times we kept them by the Hen house), was 12' all away around, the hen house..if that makes any sense? It was also wired so it would be very hard for anything to get in. And it had a cute little homemade gate.

Some day we will make another for here.

 

[Sonya]

Hi Leya, hope you had a great New Year.

I always let my chickens free-range in the day and they got locked in a stall at night (this was of course after I got rid of the minis)...prior to that I had a chicken tractor that I moved around and locked them in it at night...it was called a henspa....if you have 24 nesting boxes (if I read that correctly)...then that is plenty...mine would do the same thing, for example...5 boxes would not have an egg in it and the other 5 would have 4 in each one....you have to remember their brains are very tiny..and they only think about eating and pooping!

 

[Ladsmom]

I think you have enough nests for all your girls. Since you are evenly numbered old and new, as ling as the ones you have are not alot bigger than the new ones they could probably all go together. When I had a bunch of chickens (around 40) we only had 12 nests and that worked because they will share. We had about a 25' x 25' pen with a 2" x 3" wire at 6' high. Mine came and went as they wanted. We never had any trouble with them. The only problem was the birds coming in and eating the feed. We fed Laying Crumbles from Agway and some cracked corn thrown on the ground for them to scratch at in the evenings. Hope this helped.

 

[jacks'thunder]

Thanks every one, I appricate the help! What I did not mention was that my new girls are a big mix of chickens. Size wise they are from shoe size up to big monster layer size. My older girls are all huge so I'm worried about the little girls. I think there is banties, turkins, barred rock and all kinds of fancy mixes in the middle. I just wanted to give them something to lay in while I figured out if it's safe for the little ones or not. I think I'll just go with a 2x2' box with a 5 inch lip on it. I like the idea of 6' fence! I wonder if I can put that green mesh like fence on top to keep them in.... I'll have to look in to it! I can't let them free roam because #1 my big horse will stomp them if they get near him, 2- I have 8 barn cats and I'd just die if one tried to get my girls, 3- I have dogs and my Airedale would LOVE to eat any critter wondering around, not to mention my big newffie would just follow her and squash everything in his path! I feed pellets for layers, cracked corn, wheat, oats and bread when I have some older stuff.

Thanks again!

Leya