Our Backyard Chicken Coop

Back in August of 2010, I wrote an article on Keeping Backyard Chickens and discussed the idea of our family raising backyard chickens. Well this spring, we brought home two baby chicks that were hatched at the kids’ school. Their names are Fluffy and Chipmunk. It’s likely that Chipmunk is a hen, but not sure about Fluffy.

For weeks they lived in a small box in our home. At about nine weeks {when fully feathered}, the chicks out-grew their box and moved outside to their new coop.

Originally my husband wanted to make the coop from scratch. Knowing how much time he has one his hands {wink}, I encouraged him to drop by a nearby feed store. He came home with a chicken coop designed by Doc Woody that only needed to be assembled. {smile}

This Doc Woody guy knows his poultry and we got a smile from his bio on the back of the box.

Here is the coop built and in our backyard. We hope it is secure enough to keep the raccoons out.


The large galvanized barrel houses the birds’ water. We still need to hang it.


Here are our happy chickens in their new coop! We are crossing our fingers for some eggs in a few months.

Any advice on keeping backyard chickens is welcome!