This weekend we will be building a small duck house for our new khaki campbells. It will be a temporary solution until we actually assess what they will need long term.
There are some amazing designs out there though. The main idea is to have it as a rough dog kennel design off the ground to protect from rodents:
The one thing to consider with any coop build in Ireland whether you are in the country or urban areas is materials. They just don’t come cheap. B&Q, even with deals on can bring an average size coop cost to over €120. Thats just with wood, treatment for the wood and wire mesh. No roofing included as displayed in the nice pic above.
My long term solution to the above is this. If you can get your hands on an old dog kennel, they can be very easily modified without having to spend tons on wood. I also have being trying to lay my hands on old wooden crates and the old wooden tea boxes that I remember my parents moved house with ( and there was still a smell of tea leaves in them).
There are plenty of designs here. Try and get to a timber yard for your wood and stick to your design! We would have driven Kevin McCloud of Grand Designs off in no time with the amount of modifications we make while building!
Or get a load of old waste wood and make it look “Rustic” (the estate agents word for shite)
But the problem with that Conor is that it will rot faster than new wood, making it easier for rats and foxes to chew their way through in no time!
I told Dad about your predicament and he suggested something like this, that you could modify: http://tinyurl.com/357yyvx they sell them in Woodie’s too
Thats a great suggestion but its expensive at almost 50 pound sterling! Your Dad’s right though, find something similar and modify! Eric was in his Aunts in Tipperary last night and she had a bottom of the bed unit in the shed which he got for us still in the packaging and now, we have our duck coop at zero cost, but will have to make some modification to it. Link to pic: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=5496142&id=602554202