Upcycled Chicken Coop Builds 2

This is the 26th post in my series on cool coop builds. I haven’t been looking for the biggest or best, but ones that express the heart and soul of the owners that have interesting back stories that might inspire my readers.

I’m noticing more older folks, women and upcyclers are building their first coops. The results are so much more interesting and satisfying than buying a pre-fab coop or hiring someone to do the work for you. I’m hoping that their stories will inspire others to challenge themselves to do the same.

This post features two different chicken keepers’ creations from materials found at hand.

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My wife, Laura, and I live in eastern Washington outside of Spokane. I grew up with livestock but don’t remember too much of it.

This is my first time having chickens in many years: four Silkies and six Black Copper Marans. They free range all day and the only time they spend in run is when we are out of town. 

It’s not my first building project. I do construction for a living and have built many things.

I have always liked funky buildings and have wanted to build something different for many years.  I knew what shape I wanted and just kinda winged it with what I thought looked good. My wife and I built it over a week. It took some thinking how to figure out how to frame it.

Budget 

We used scrap materials and spent $600 for purchased

Coop 8’x8’ and the run is 8’x18′

Features

It’s a pretty basic straightforward set up inside the coop

• Pull cord on the outside for the door
• Three nest boxes and two roost bars that run the full 8’  
• Run has a few roost bars

Plans for the future

• We’re going to change the roost bars when we get some more birds to utilize space better

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I live in rural Northwest Arkansas and have been raising a small flock hovering around 16 birds for about four years.

I currently have six hens and one rooster, down significantly from the May 2024 tornado incident that occurred here that killed a lot of my birds and destroyed their chicken coop. I currently have a mix of Black Easter Eggers, BlueLaced Red Wyandotte, Cuckoo Marans and Silver Leghorn but hope to build the flock back to around 16-20 birds for the family.

This is my first built chicken coop, but I have worked on other farm projects like greenhouses, etc. I came up with the plans on my own. I acquired some large round steel fibre conduit spools a couple years ago. Looking online, I couldn’t find an example of someone building a chicken coop out of one, but since I had the material my wife Katie and I decided it would be an awesome project if executed properly. I built a greenhouse frame out of one last year, so I had the tools necessary to cut the metal and attach material properly. 

I did the work with a little help from my daughters, wife and father-in-law. It took about 8 hours of work total, most of which was just thinking about how to execute the design in my head. I could build one in just a few hours now that I know how to build it. 

Budget 

I didn’t have a budget in mind. The spool and sheet metal were unused materials laying around the farm. The plastic secondary entrance was built from leftover greenhouse materials. I had to spend about $60 in 2”x4” and 2”x2” lumber for the door and ground framing, $20 in large nuts and bolts to attach the wood to the metal frame and $60 on hinges and handle pulls. 

Coop and Run 

Coop: 8’ diameter spool set 4’ wide. The coop has a volume of 201 Cubic feet. My run is just Starkline electric poultry netting with a solar kit – 4’ tall x 164’ long which I frequently move around the land. This was in use and salvaged from the tornado damage.

Features

• The metal bars connecting laterally from “wheel” to “wheel” serve as both the roosting bars and as the base for holding my plastic-totes which I use as removable laying boxes.
• The coop can be moved by rolling it across the grass, although it is heavy enough to require two people to safely do so. 
• The ability to quickly remove the laying boxes was an essential aspect of the design. 
• Large main entrance requiring little crouching to get inside and harvest eggs. 
• Tiny chicken door built into the main large door. 
• Secondary hatch door on the back side covered in greenhouse plastic, which allows my family the ability to access the back side of the coop for cleaning, maintenance and the occasional dropped egg. It also serves to warm the coop in the winter due to the greenhouse effect. It can be opened to allow additional airflow on hot summer days as well.

Plans for the future 

I would like to add an automatic chicken door. 

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Thanks to Shannon and Dustin for sharing their coops and photos, used with permission.