Day 88

I wanted our new coop to be designed so that it was fun and functional. However, trying to design something for a task I've never done before can be tricky.

Our barn essentially had twelve stalls, six on each side. The middle area was open for storage and or equipment. Besides large sliding doors at the front and back, there was a regular door on each side. On the west side, it was in the fourth stall, near the middle of the barn. This was the stall we made into our first coop. To accommodate the new girls, we decided to do something similar for three more stalls. If we labeled staples 1-6 from front to back, we decided 2-5 would be coops. Using cabinets we salvaged, stall 1 would be storage for chicken supplies. There was a very nice sliding door between stalls 5 and 6, so we chose that to be the “end” of the coop. We did want to use stall 6 though. Since it had a much dustier floor, we figured it  would be a place for them to relax and dust bath. We also created a chicken  door to the outside by removing a panel and installing a rope and pulley system. 

As you would probably guess, creating the design was much easier then the actual implementation of that design. Whether it was finding pockets of time, accessing the right tool, or making my fair share of novice handyman mistakes, creating the coops was quite an arduous process.

Completing the brunt of this expanded coop work independently was very rewarding, both physically and emotionally. I learned alot  about our barn and myself by spending hours there, mostly alone except for the blaring music of old CD’s and an even older six-disc changing CD player. As I encountered issues, I got better and better at troubleshooting along the way. I enjoyed using my newly acquired table saw and staple gun. Removing wood was a good physical challenge that saved me a few trips to the gym. 

As wonderful as the process made me feel both inside and out,  one step forced me to put my pride aside and ask for help.