Chicken Coops for Sale in Center Cross, Virginia
Chicken Coops for Sale in Center Cross, Virginia
Chicken Coops — The Top 5 Requirements
Chicken Coops – What You Need
Happy, healthy chickens need proper housing, but knowing what you need may seem daunting. Don’t let choosing the house for your chickens intimidate you. Meeting the needs of your flock, whether building your own chicken castle or buying ready-made, is easy and should provide for four basic needs.
- Protection from the elements
- Protection from predators
- Place for laying eggs
- A roost at night
The Components of a Chicken Coop
As I wrote in my , chickens have an innate homing instinct, keeping your flock close to home. Our feathered kids are such home bodies that even free ranging, every night before sundown all our chickens are perched in the coop. I always recommend a protected place for your flock to come home and roost for the night, even when free ranging.
You don’t need a poultry castle for your chickens to come home to. come in many shapes, sizes, and designs, from fancy to plain. Believe it or not, your chickens won’t care what the coop looks like as long as it provides the above four basic needs.
With that said, before deciding what type of coop you are going to buy or build, you must determine what coop features are needed that most closely conform to a chicken’s natural behavior. Hopefully I can help you understand what you need in the design of your chicken coop.
The Basics
Let’s start with the basics. All chicken coops need 3 things; a roof, 4 walls, and a doorway for entering and leaving. The design and the materials used for the chicken coop is up to you. As long as it is mostly draft free (you still need healthy ventilation), your choices are endless.
Your coop space is based on the number of chickens you plan to house. A good rule of thumb is 4 square feet of floor space per large chicken and 3 square feet for the smaller bantam breeds. Also consider the ease of cleaning when choosing your coop design; you’ll be glad you did.
Security
Making a chicken coop predator free is the most important part of building a home for your flock. Your coop must be secure from the top, bottom, and all sides. When looking at any pre-made coop or chicken coop building plans, consider all angles for security. Not only should you consider the security of the coop itself, but the security of the yard and run as well.
When choosing the wire for your run and coop, we advise steering clear of standard chicken wire. While it works well for keeping your chickens contained it’s not entirely predator proof. Because the holes in standard chicken wire are large, coyotes, raccoons, and foxes can still reach through the mesh, causing harm to your chickens. Always use a small hole wire like hardware cloth with ½ inch openings.
Another consideration when building the chicken yard or run, is airborne predators like hawks. You must include covering the top of the run as well. Our chicken runs use the same size mesh fencing on the top as the sides.
Finally, there are predators from below, such as rats and mice. These critters are attracted to the feed and droppings and like to burrow under your coop. Protect your chickens by using a coop with a floor built into it or burying small mesh fencing below the coop and extending it about 12 inches out on all sides.
The Outside Run
All coops need a connecting chicken run or pen. Chickens need access to the outside to do all those “chicken things”, like dirt baths, catching bugs, scratching dirt, or just relaxing in the sunshine or shade.
Ideally, your chicken run should have 10 square feet of ground space per full size chicken. The smaller bantam breeds require less, about 7 square feet per chicken. If your chickens free range the majority of the day, you can get by with less space.
Laying Boxes
If you want eggs, you need laying boxes. These can be as fancy or as plain as you like, just as long as they are about 12” x 12” and raised off the ground a few inches. You need one box for every 4 laying hens. Boxes should comfortably fit the chicken and have low enough sides for the hens to step over. Be sure to keep your boxes lined with clean straw or other bedding.
Roosting Perches
All birds roost, including chickens. Your coop needs a roosting bar or something off the ground on which your chickens can perch. We strongly suggest having perches both inside the coop and outside in the run area.
When figuring roosting pole size, provide 5-10” of space per chicken and 10” of space between each pole if you are using more than one. Multiple poles also need grading like ladders so the farthest pole is several inches higher than the next.
There are many shapes, sizes, and styles of chicken coops to choose from. Making the right choice for your needs is important, and all coops need to contain all necessary elements.
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Baby Chick Varieties in Center Cross, Virginia
A good place to start any search is the internet. Simply plugging in the phrase "chicken coops for sale in Center Cross Virginia" into any one of the numerous search engines and a wealth of information will pop up. This information will provide links to other websites that will be informative and will provide the right direction for finding Center Cross Virginia chicken coops. What to look for when buying a chicken coop in Center Cross, Virginia With the massive rise in poultry keeping there has actually been an equally huge rise in the array of poultry stuff for sale. Fowl housing is a proceedings in factor. It's also a classic instance of the great old bandwagon being got on as various prospective fowl housing experts pitch an array of accommodation claiming to be the excellent remedy to your chicken housing needs. Often the cost looks appealing, your diy-chicken-coop-planshome looks attractive, heck also the clean-cut household standing there feeding the chickens look attractive. Definitely they understand a professional chicken house when they see one? There are several affordable and awful coops swamping the market. I understand this as I've checked a variety of them in the field, and seen a ewe run straight through one when the feed container showed up. The outcome was nothing but a pricey pile of firewood and also a small flock of bemused and also currently homeless bantams.
Chicken Coop For Sale in Center Cross, Virginia
Most of the time these standardized designs are created of quick grown hardwood - come the first drop of rainfall they swell, leaving you either blockading a door that will not close, or ripping the door furniture off in a vain effort to launch the squawking citizens. The first cozy day means the timber dries as well as splits, the really felt roofing bubbles and boils, and also come nightfall the hens refuse to go in. This is not due to their disappointment at the decrease of their when appealing apartment however due to the fact that the hovel is now a place for, and also most likely crawling with, the poultry keeper's bane, red mite. Add the fact that it claimed on the blurb that it would certainly suit four huge chickens when that stocking density was based upon the Circle Line at 5pm on a Friday, as well as what are you left with? A few hinges as well as some kindling. A decent coop for thee to 4 birds need to cost you around ₤ 300 though this could depend upon whether you choose for a totally free standing house or one with a run connected. Presuming you are varying your birds in a large space and also the pop hole doorway is big enough for the breed you maintain, then the main requirements of housing boil down to three factors which will define the variety of birds your house will hold; perches, nest boxes and also ventilation. The majority of types of chicken will perch when they visit roost during the night, this perch must preferably be 5-8cm large with smoothed off sides so the foot sits conveniently on it. The perch needs to be above the nest box entry as chickens will also normally search for the acme to perch. A perch less than that will have the birds roosting in the nest box overnight (which is incidentally when they create the most poo) bring about stained eggs the list below day. They should not nonetheless be so high off the flooring of the house that leg injuries might take place when the bird gets down in the morning. Chickens need regarding 20cm of perch each (in small breeds this is obviously less), plus if more than one perch is installed in your home they should be greater than 30cm apart. They will certainly hunker up with their neighbors but are not that crazy about roosting with a beak in the bloomers of the bird in front. Preferably the house must have a least one nest box for every three birds and also these must be off the ground as well as in the darkest location of your home. Your house needs to have adequate air flow: without it then condensation will certainly accumulate every evening, even in the coldest of climate. Understand, air flow works with the concept of warm and comfortable air leaving via a high gap drawing cooler air in from a lower gap - it's not a set of holes on opposite wall surfaces of the house and at the exact same degree, this is just what's called a draught. If you have a house with a run affixed then the factors above are still real, yet you must likewise take into consideration the run size. The EU optimum legal equipping density for a free array bird is (and let's face it, among the inspirations for keeping some hens at home is perhaps enhanced or better welfare) 2,500 birds per hectare, that's maximum one bird per 4m squared. Take a close consider several of the bargain homes - it could well be the house has the right perches, correct ventilation and also sufficient nest boxes for a sensible number of birds, but will each of the chickens have anything greater than an A4 sized item of ground to invest the day on? And so as the saying goes, "you obtain exactly what you spend for". You might think you've got hold of a deal, yet you and your group might rue the day you did. Acquisition the best house and also it will certainly last for a couple of decades, otherwise longer offered the correct treatment. Eventually your poultry and also your fowl keeping experience will be considerably the much better for it.coop plan
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