A good location is the first consideration in the building of a poultry house. Select a well drained spot, facing the southeast and large enough to make comfortable quarters for the chickens.
The house is built of any kind of durable and well-seasoned lumber. The kind of material used in making the floor will depend largely on the soil and the money to be spent in the construction of the house. Board floors are often used but they are more susceptible to rats. Cement floors are more easily cleaned and more sanitary, and not so expensive in a locality where plenty of gravel is available. A board floor must be raised several inches from the ground as a protection from rats and to allow for runners to be placed underneath the house.
A portable poultry house, showing the exterior and interior
Roosts are placed on the same level with each other next to the end or back walls and from 6” to 10” above the dropping boards, which are 2½” from the floor. Roosts may be stationary as in the cut, or they may be fastened by hinges to the walls and raised to clean the dropping board.
Roost spacing will depend upon the size of the fowls, but a 10” space to each fowl is usually sufficient. They must be put 15” apart.
Nests made 14” square are built under the dropping boards around the walls of the house as shown in cut. A 4” piece of wood is placed on the side, which drops as a door in front of the nests.
Windows as shown in the cut are more expensive and not as good as a front made of wood extending about 2’ from the bottom. Wire screening, admitting better ventilation and more sunlight, is tacked over the rest of the opening in the front. A curtain may be made of unbleached muslin and fastened on a pole at the top of the open front, which may be lowered as a protection in bad weather.
Make the roof of some water tight material and cover the walls on the inside to protect the fowls from draughts.