[mistryer]

Setting up a new chicken area, and hubby wants to make arks rather than huts. What's your preference and what are the pros and cons?

[Hermit]

Personally I think arks are cruel, they serve their purpose for a broody or quaranteened hen for example , but to keep chooks in them permanently should be banned. Battery hens with a view. Huts in a large run are the way to go if they need to be confined. You can get small huts with decent sized runs for a few birds , but always ay least halve what the manufacturers say they can hold. Chooks like to jump and flap about and hop on and off things which they cant do in an ark. I would not keep a guinea pig in some of the arks I have seen. I would set up a proper chicken run your chooks will be a lot less stressed.

[chrismahon]

Do you mean the difference between mobile and fixed coops Mistyer?

Fixed are limited by their location but can be much bigger. Ideal for a fixed run. If they are small you can attach handles and lift them.

Mobile are only such if you can lmove them after it has rained. Biggest mobile we have will take 10 in comfort with 4 nest boxes and has recently been refurbished because the cladding used to absorb too much water. Even the nest box lid is removeable to make them lmoveable. Ours look like a coop on a wheelbarrow or subframe. Traditional arks had 4 cast iron wheels and were dragged by a tractor. Modern ones I have seen with two wheels attached to the coop, no chassis. Wouldn't like to try lifting one.

[mistryer]

Hermit, it is not to lock them in permanently. We've built them a huge run, but have been debating whether to build them arks to sleep/lay eggs in (hubby wants to build arks) or give them huts. I know the headroom can be an issue, so needs to be tall enough etc. He thinks it is easier and less expensive to construct. I have only used huts, so don't know anything about the merits of arks, apart from the mobile ones, that you can move the hens around each day, for fresh pasture. These would be fixed, and we'd shut them up at night, as lots of foxes here. They will have a huge fenced off area for through the day. You sound like you are happy with yours, chrismahon? Are yours just for the mobile groups?

[Hermit]

To me arks are those little triangle, rabbit hutch type things with a sleeping area at one end and a tiny run at the other. I even see turkeys in those. Sorry I thought you meant those versus  huts with runs. A large triangle shape to sleep and lay in sounds fine, they are easy to build, we have them dotted on the hill for the geese to lay in, but they dont get locked in at night as we dont have foxes here. We have built ours with the wood that overlaps on the roof .

[PetiteGalette]

Whatever shape you choose, it is a lot easier to thoroughly clean out and disinfect a house that you can stand up in!

MoH built all ours on home-made pallets that can be lifted up and moved on the forks on the back of the ancient tractor (S reg David Brown first-time round). The houses are moved round the fields, and fresh enclosures provided by Heras panels tied together and pushed into the ground up to the low cross bar.
We, too, have a fox problem despite the hunters out for 5 months a year every Thursday & Sunday. Some of our older (heavy) chickens and ginormous cockerel are behind 1 metre electric chicken fencing and after 5 years, touch wood............, no problems..................................

[mistryer]

Think I've got him back to a hut idea again - must admit, I like it when I can walk into it too. Want it big enough for 12 layers and a cock - would you say 5/6 nest boxes?