Each combined pen and shed covers eighteen by ten feet, the curtained-front shed being ten by ten feet, and the roosting-room adjoining being eight by ten feet, room sufficient for twenty-five to thirty fowls of the American or thirty-five to forty of the Mediterranean varieties. No “walk” is required because the walk is through gates and doors, from shed to pen and pen to shed, and so on to the end of the house and out the other end. The much-desired ventilation of the poultry house is very varied in this plan, at the discretion and according to the judgment of the operator, and can be adapted to the different seasons in half a dozen different ways. In summer the doors and windows are all wide open and the curtains are hooked up against the roof out of the way. (It is to be remembered that the doors between two pens are never to be left open when there are birds in the pens, they are always kept closed except when opened for the attendant to pass through from one pen to another). When the nights begin to be decidedly frosty in the fall close the windows in the fronts of the roosting pens, but leave shed-curtains hooked up and doors between pens and sheds open. When it begins to freeze nights close the curtains (at night) in fronts of sheds, but still leave doors between pens and sheds open. These doors (including the slide door) are never closed excepting on nights of solid cold, say when the thermometer runs five to twenty degrees below zero; and for real zero weather, from five above to away below zero, close the curtains in front of roosts and all doors and windows are closed. An additional protection against cold in extremely cold latitudes would be to double-wall the back of the roost-pen, from the sill up to plate and then up the roof-rafters four feet, packing the spaces between the studs and rafters with planer shavings, straw, swale hay, or seaweed (the latter is vermin-proof), then have a hinged curtain to drop down to within about six inches of front of roost platform, and extending a foot below it; this curtain we would close only on the very coldest nights.
We would build this house seven feet high in front and five feet high at the back. Sills and plates are all of two by four scantling, halved and nailed together at joints. The rafters, corner studs, and studs in centers of fronts of sheds are all two by four; the intermediate studs are two by three. Set the sills on stone foundation a foot and a half above the ground level, or on posts set into the ground below the usual frost line, the posts being set five feet apart excepting in front of roosting pens (where they come four feet apart)—there being a post at corner of each pen and shed, with one between. The rafters should be two feet between centers; as lumber comes twelve, fourteen, or sixteen feet in length, and two-feet-apart rafters allow the lumber to be used with almost no waste. The sills we would set a foot and a half above average ground level. When set on posts put hemlock (or some hard wood) boards from bottom half of sill down to ground, nailing them firmly to sill and foundation posts; then fill up inside to bottom of sills and slope the ground outside to same height, as illustrated in Fig. 1. Toe-nail studs to sills firmly, plates to studs ditto, and rafters to plates. Set the studs in front of roosting pens to take the window frames (or the window sash, if no frames are used), and in partitions a stud should be set to take the two and one half feet wide doors and gates. All of the framing is simple and easy, and any man who can saw off a board or joist reasonably square and drive nails straight can build this house; the slight bevel at each end of rafters being perfectly simple. All boarding is lengthwise, the boards firmly nailed and good joints made all over. Cover the roof and sides with Paroid, and the house will be wind and waterproof.
Fig. 32—The Continuous, Curtained-Front Scratching-shed Poultry.