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Posted: 3/30/2007 3:30:56 PM EDT
We only have 4/10th of an acre, and it's not zoned for livestock, but we'd like to keep a half dozen hens. We decided to build a chicken coop under our deck, where it won't be visible from the road or the neighbor's house. I've planted grapevines and blueberry bushes as a screen. I'm going to use a basement window as their door to an inside structure that will contain food, water and a couple laying boxes. I haven't decided how big to make that yet, but outside under the deck they'll have about 200 square feet. Today we put up hog panels, and tomorrow I'll line them on the inside with chicken wire. That's Private Root Beer inside, helping by digging holes everywhere and hitting things with a hammer.
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Posted: 3/30/2007 3:38:24 PM EDT
[#1]
sweet setup, very efficient use of space. Might be a tad overkill, but you never know.
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Posted: 3/30/2007 3:47:29 PM EDT
[#2]
rodent:
Nice setup... I'm am most definitely NOT flaming your post, but I have two really well intentioned comments to make. These are offered in a serious friend-helping-friend manner..../ One suggestion; Chikins is dirty, noisy birds. They often get to squawkin up a storm, and leave a fine, dust-like powder on EVERYTHING. Air quality can really suffer in a coop, and ammonia buildup can be rapid. I really like the under deck idea BUT I would think seriously before placing the coop inside the building envelope. One other issue: These are confinement birds (under your deck). Even if the deck is 12x20 and you only have 6 birds, those girls will have 2" of chikkin shit in there in no time. Any rain coming in from the deck above will turn the ground under into a poop soup. The stink will drive you off your deck. Trust me. Its an unholy aroma. If you want to be within 50 feet of that deck you are going to either 1) remove manure frequently, or 2) keep it dry Buy buff orpington birds. Big golden gentle birds. Call to them as you walk up and scatter some feed. Teach Pv. Rootbeer to pull grass to feed em. They'll quickly come running to greet him... |
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Posted: 3/30/2007 3:55:04 PM EDT
[#3]
Your problem will not be the neighbors seeing the chickens. the neighbors hearing the chickens will be your problem. Chickens are noisy.
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Posted: 3/30/2007 3:57:57 PM EDT
[#4]
Just so you read this twice . Cause its VERY GOOD INFO....... I could not imagine chickens under the deck and that close to the house ...BAD IDEA . |
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Posted: 3/30/2007 3:58:38 PM EDT
[#5]
My SHTF chicken post was laughed at...oh, well.
My advice. Don't do what your doing. Chickens need about 7 sq ft a piece and a coop needs better ventilation. Amonia level will build up and you will not have healthy or happy birds. Unhappy birds do not lay well. Hens do not make alot of noise but they still make enough for your neighbors to hear. They aren't very intrussive, but they will get excited in the middle of the night frequently. Your plan will be OK for quite a while, but they will not remain a secret and they will have to come out from under the house. Kids love 'em, have fun. |
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Posted: 3/30/2007 4:06:34 PM EDT
[#6]
I think we've gotta have at least the water in there just to keep it from freezing - there are times when nobody is home here for three of four days at a time, and we don't want to rely on electricity.
They'll be let out most days, but even so we should probably limit it to three hens or so. Even that's probably more eggs than we'd use. My family always had chickens (we used to call them "mobile lawn ornaments"), and I think the secret to not smelling them is to give them plenty of room.
I used to keep Guinea fowl, and I like them better than chickens - they have more "personality", and they remind me of Africa. But they sound like souls in Hell, and I'm not sure the neihbors would appreciate them as much as I do. I also like ducks better, but don't want them pooping in the lake where we swim and get our drinking water. |
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Posted: 3/30/2007 4:12:12 PM EDT
[#7]
Six hens in 200 square feet is 33 square feet each, and how much better can the ventilation be with three sides open? |
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Posted: 3/30/2007 5:28:49 PM EDT
[#8]
man I wouldn't keep them under the porch, unless your gonna clean the coop pretty often, chickens stink like mad,
when I was a kid my parents had over 300 of them, they used to make me and my bros clean all the shit outta the coop, and rake the pen once a week, then haul it down to one of the garden areas, if we didn't we'd smell them, and the pen was 100 yards from the house, hell chicken even stinks when you cook'em, but they sure taste good fried. |
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Posted: 3/30/2007 7:04:28 PM EDT
[#9]
Try Chicken tractors. Lots of info if you google it.
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Posted: 3/31/2007 2:27:29 AM EDT
[#10]
There's the problem. 300 people crammed into a pen would stink, too.
I'm planning on it. I'll let them de-bug, till and fertilize the garden for me every spring and fall. |
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Posted: 3/31/2007 6:23:29 AM EDT
[#11]
[Johnny_Reno childhood memory]Dem chickins be stanky birds.[/Johnny_Reno childhood memory]
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Posted: 3/31/2007 10:11:25 AM EDT
[#12]
With chickens, if you spend plenty of time with them(especially when they're young) they'll be more tame, sometimes too tame.
 Sometimes mine get underfoot when I'm trying to walk around my yard, and when you have a bad back, tripping over chickens is no fun.
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Posted: 3/31/2007 11:27:14 AM EDT
[#13]
The criticism is sound. This is one of those "looks good on paper" ideas that will fail in the real world.
The idea is neat but chicken stink. Your not going to be able to use the deck when it gets hot outside, the aroma will soon be overpowering. Trust my advice and others this is a bad idea. -JTP |
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Posted: 3/31/2007 12:16:14 PM EDT
[#14]
Would you ever consider rabbits? Something tells me their going to be easier to keep than chickens.
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Posted: 3/31/2007 1:22:15 PM EDT
[#15]
But the market on rabbit eggs is very seasonal. 
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Posted: 3/31/2007 1:31:46 PM EDT
[#16]
You know all those old farms you've seen in picture and movies?
Theres a reason the hen house is on the other side of the farm from the house. 
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Posted: 3/31/2007 1:39:38 PM EDT
[#17]
Recheck zoning.. many areas permit hens but no roosters..
Call it a house pet if not... |
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Posted: 3/31/2007 2:03:40 PM EDT
[#18]
Crowded chickens turn cannibal, make sure you provide oyster shell as it minimizes the fatalities. The bottom of your wire fencing needs to be well into the ground to prevent night visitors. Weasels can go straight thru the wire in pic.
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Posted: 3/31/2007 2:06:48 PM EDT
[#19]
cool Idea till the heat of summer with the windows open
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Posted: 3/31/2007 2:19:32 PM EDT
[#20]
I think it will work well if you only keep two or three hens in there. I once had two hens in a small pen on my .43 acres and they weren't a problem at all. The little chicken coop I made wasn't much more than a rabbit hutch, really. They also provided more fresh eggs than my family of four could use at the time.
You will be in trouble though if you have racoons around there. They will burrow under the fence and kill the chickens just for the fun of it. ETA: My wife got my chicks for our daughters at Easter, and I was left to deal with them after they grew up. This project has to be completed because PRB seems to have been promised chickens! |
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Posted: 3/31/2007 2:47:54 PM EDT
[#21]
From the original post: "I'll line the (hog panels) on the inside with chicken wire".
I had both rabbits and chickens (and calves, horses, woodchucks, raccoons, crows, pigeons, a deer, etc.) for most of my youth, and I think chickens are just as easy and more practical. If I want rabbit meat, I just go for a walk with a .22.
I can't imagine that a handful of hens in a huge, dry, well-ventilated coop are going to be a smell problem. But I'll post updates and let everyone know how the project proceeds. Most people associate chickens with stink because most chicken coops are way too crowded. Any animal, humans included, stink if packed into a small space and obliged to wade in their own filth. |
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Posted: 3/31/2007 3:16:37 PM EDT
[#22]
+1 And name the chickens Spot and Rover.
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Posted: 3/31/2007 3:39:01 PM EDT
[#23]
I just started a chicken project too.
Already got rid of one dog. Girlfriend is building a coop outside, here in AZ they need shade more than anything. They will be let out of the coop during the day and put up at night. I have a cool ass Japanese black bantam rooster that is not very loud. |
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Posted: 4/1/2007 4:06:05 PM EDT
[#24]
Maybe you could line the bottom of your porch with a large tarp or visqeen. Then rake the poo once a week. That should keep the aroma to a minimum.
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Posted: 4/1/2007 5:28:41 PM EDT
[#25]
I thought you were keeping Private Root beer in there. Hey they keep pot bellied pigs as pets why not chickens? I wouldn't want to keep them that close to the house, EB will be bitching you pout alot. Chickens are stinky...i have about 12 wild turkeys in the rear of my backyard.... |
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Posted: 4/1/2007 6:05:51 PM EDT
[#26]
Tag to see the follow up in about 3 months.
Promise you will follow up in this thread, no matter the outcome. Oh, and one more thing. Avian Flu. |
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Posted: 4/1/2007 6:44:23 PM EDT
[#27]
Aside from the risk of Avian Flu, there's also eggs and the meat supply(on the "hoof", you could say). I've been keeping the birds around for around 15 years, and if it wasn't for the birds, I wouldn't even be able to grow a garden or keep fruit trees, so I think they're worth the trouble and the risk.
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Posted: 6/18/2007 11:57:43 AM EDT
[#28]
tag for later chicken goodness
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Posted: 6/18/2007 12:23:26 PM EDT
[#29]
Where's the Chicken!!!!!!!!!
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Posted: 6/18/2007 12:29:41 PM EDT
[#30]
Post some chicken pics.
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Posted: 6/18/2007 12:47:44 PM EDT
[#31]
picture isn't working for me
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Posted: 6/18/2007 1:18:21 PM EDT
[#32]
+1 on the dust.... it gets everywhere!!!!
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Posted: 6/18/2007 7:45:37 PM EDT
[#33]
If the above plus the other comments about chickens stinking wasn't enough, add me as a +1. God I hate the smell of chicken shit. I live in a farming/ranching town and I can get used to dairy smells and large cattle ranches, cow shit isn't all that bad in my opinion. But chicken shit burns my nose at the slightest wiff, hate towns that make use of chicken manure and hate chickens in general due to that. Instead of chickens I'd look into rabbits but they can be a pain in the ass when they start to burrow out of the pin, would need to look into decent sized cages. |
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Posted: 6/18/2007 8:33:33 PM EDT
[#34]
What exactly are you trying to accomplish by keeping 3 chickens under your porch?...Sounds like a bunch of trouble for what? I can get eggs for a $1 a doz. at the dollar store and you are going to all this trouble to get maybe 1 or 2 eggs a day?.....You know it is sort of like making a paper cup... why do it when you can get paper cups for about nothing?.....Todd
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Posted: 6/18/2007 10:50:15 PM EDT
[#35]
It's the value of the experience. BTW, when I first set out in life and had a great job with a great company, I asked a fairly hot 20ish lady, that lived out in the country aways, for a date. She accepted and gave me directions to her house. Well, when I got there chickens were everywhere, We decided to go to a drive-in and when we got there I could not stand how she smelled, exactly like chicken shit! It was so bad that there was no way I could do anything with her except take her home like a gentleman. She was so cute  I really was disappointed she smelled so bad.
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Posted: 6/18/2007 11:12:13 PM EDT
[#36]
I suppose you could call those pale-yellow-yolked things you buy in the store eggs, since they are technically eggs, but I consider them eggs in name only. It's the same for many other things. You can buy "tomatoes" in the store, too, and probably cheaper than you can grow them at home, but try to find a Black Krim tomato(or even a tomato that has as much flavor as a Black Krim tomato ), and you may end up paying quite a bit more, IF you can even find one for sale anywhere. It's gotten so bad for me now that I have a hard time forcing myself to eat those "plastic" tomatoes(which often don't even have any tomato flavor at all ).
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Posted: 6/19/2007 4:16:55 AM EDT
[#37]
I like a yard with Mobile Lawn Ornaments. 
The chickens are here, and I've also been given three guinea fowl. I'll post more pics as they get older and start laying. Achoo. |
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Posted: 6/19/2007 8:05:34 AM EDT
[#38]
I suppose you could call those pale-yellow-yolked things you buy in the store eggs, since they are technically eggs, but I consider them eggs in name only..... quote] I used to raise free range chickens, had around 20 to 30 most times and while I know it's the "in" thing to say how better the eggs tast damn if i could ever see a real difference between thiers and store bought ones...till you got an egg that sat in a nesting box that you missed somehow for a few hot days. I thinking raising chickens definatly could have a place on the farmstead, they are great for recycling scraps and bugs to eggs and meat. I basicaly got cob corn for free to feed them too. I didn't really do much to my birds and for the most part they took care of thierselves.I think today [might be different in an end of the world thing] to build a coop and really take care of them etc. you have to like to and want to raise chickens and be into it because of that and not that it makes real "sense" too...and nothing wrong with that!....To keep 3 of them under your porch, you have to REALLY like to raise chickens I guess I think if i wanted to keep poultry under the porch I'd go with Quail, I used to raise them also [in a pen] and they don't make any noise, get along better, smell less and easier to fool with and do well caged up. Eggs are smaller but I believe they produce more and earlier then chickens too.Same with raising them for meat. The eggs are tastier, well at least stronger tasting I guess more like a duck or goose egg I always thought .....Todd |
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Posted: 6/19/2007 9:26:50 AM EDT
[#39]
There is nothing stealthy about a guinea hen. Very loud. They will certainly warn you if anything is in your yard. Neat birds though. |
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Posted: 6/19/2007 9:41:36 AM EDT
[#40]
I like their eggs, and I love the way they go after ticks and Japanese beetles, so I put up with the noise. Besides, like you said, they're good watchdogs.
I can tell a HUGE difference. I had chickens, guinea fowl, ducks and quail up until I went to college. I liked the ducks best, and the quail least.
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Posted: 6/19/2007 7:44:09 PM EDT
[#41]
Serious? Freakin' CHICKENS are good watch...umm, birds? |
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Posted: 6/19/2007 8:16:36 PM EDT
[#42]
Nope, Guinea Hens are very alert and will squawk when anything, man or beast, comes around. The only problem is that their squawk is the voice of the devil and they are very vocal birds. If I didn't live in a subdivision I've have a couple or three of them around...no more bugs. Heck I've even looked in to picking a couple of them up and free ranging them in the back yard/woods on the sly. -JTP |
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Posted: 7/7/2007 4:30:05 AM EDT
[#43]
Here's your three-month update: None of the predicted odor problems. 7 contented chickens. I think the secret is to simply give them plenty of room. Each hen has plenty of square feet of space both inside the coop and in the covered run under our deck. They almost never go inside, even when it's raining. Private Root Beer calls them his "Peep Army" and considers himself the "Peep Shepherd". We let them out in the afternoons and they provide some good entertainment as they run around the yard chasing bugs. Just saw the first Japanese beetle of the season yesterday, if they eat those things they'll be worth keeping for that alone. So far we have been spared the avian flu. I consider this experiment a success. |
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Posted: 7/8/2007 11:35:28 AM EDT
[#44]
I have 4 hens in an 80 sq foot area and I change the litter every 6 months. It doesn't stink, the birds get out every day in the summer, and a couple times a week in the winter. The only time it stinks is if the litter gets wet or when I am raising meat birds and there are another dozen in the same area.
I have an ameracuana that lays green eggs and three buff orpingtons. Great birds that don't make noise. Don't get a rooster or guinea hens if you want peace and quiet.
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Posted: 7/27/2007 1:44:06 PM EDT
[#45]
Somebody gave me two guinea fowl, and we hatched a couple Marans, so our homestead flock is up to eleven. Three of the silkies are roosters, and we've named them all "Stew". Their time is approaching rapidly.
I've been thinking about the economics of all this, and find it impossible to do an objective cost analysis. But on the very simplest level: Each hen consumes about 100 pounds of pellets per year (they do a lot of their own foraging, and dispose of most of our kitchen scraps as well). That costs about $20. Each hen lays around 16 dozen eggs a year. You could buy that many in a supermarket for between $32 and $48. So strictly in terms of what goes in and what comes out, we're ahead $12 to $28 per hen per year. Expenses I haven't or can't take into account: Initial cost of fencing, housing, feeders, waterers, incubator, stock. Electricity to light the coop in the winter. Losses due to predation. My time (Not that my time is worth much - if I wasn't feeding chickens I'd be surfing Arfcom or downloading porn...) Benefits I haven't or can't take into account: You can't buy fresher, healthier, better-tasting eggs. The yolks are huge and orange. Occasional dinners courtesy of the roosters and culled hens. They till, weed, and fertiize the garden in the spring and fall for free, and far better than you could do it. They dispose of almost all our kitchen waste. They hammer the bugs. I'd guess that they cut the Japanese beetles in half, and I haven't seen a tick in the yard this year, although there are plenty elsewhere. They provide entertainment and satisfaction. When you to to a friend's for dinner, a dozen fresh dark-brown eggs is almost as good a gift as the usual bottle of wine. Last but not least, if Avian Flu or some other virus devastates the commercial poultry industry, I'll still be having omelettes for breakfast. |
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