Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Poultry and Pets => The Hen House => Topic started by: snowdrops on November 05, 2019, 13:35
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You may recall in January we built a secure walk in run & hen house to rehome my daughters 4 chickens at the plot. All has been fine, realise now that the construction of the house makes thorough cleaning out a bit difficult. There’s a lift out black tray under the roosting bars & shavings etc fall through when I lift it out & then there’s too many ledges to get to sweep it out. So problem no 1.
No. 2 only 3 chickens now roost on the lowest bar.
No. 3 I’ve now rehome my granddaughters 3 chickens, we’ve temporarily halved the run with the intention of putting them altogether.
No. 4 the original house has only 2 nest boxes, how many do I realistically need for 7 chickens when I’m sure 1 doesn’t lay or at least not very often.
Question 1, to make more room for all 7 to roost I could do away with the original 2 nest boxes that are internal, reconfigure the roosting bars & put some external nest boxes attached to the house & cut through.
2. Put nest boxes elsewhere in the run.
3. Do I just start with a new house that would be easier to clean out designed for 7 chickens but bearing in mind some are getting on a bit.
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can you put up pics of the house?
my house has slide tray at bottom, 3 tier roosting bars one side and 1 bar slightly lower next to 2 internal nest boxes. Opposite side to nest boxes drops down.
Chickens will always try to nest on highest bar.
An easier way to clean a hen house is to have the front of the house on hinges to open for cleaning, but that would also need the roosting bars to sit in a holder attached to the roof and the back of the house.