There are not a lot of requirements in the particulars that concern chickens houses. These birds are very easy to build dwellings for and they are happy as long as they have a dry place to roost at night and a place they can lay their eggs. Of course as people we want to do much better for our pets than that.
Chickens houses are typically designed to accommodate both the number of birds you will have staying in the structure and the location you have to construct the structure in. These things will let you know about the size you need and the materials you need to use.
When building chickens houses you need to take into consideration the number of birds you will have and the breed of birds you will have. Some chickens are decidedly larger than others so the breed does make a difference. A Bantam chicken is a very small bird that does not get much larger than a good sized quail and does not weigh very much. A Buff Orpington is a large breed of chicken that will generally weigh five to eight pounds if not more. It takes considerably more room in the chickens houses to keep a dozen Buff Orpington birds than it does to keep a dozen Bantam birds.
Next you will consider the area you live in so you can purchase the correct materials for the construction of the chickens houses(or as it is called in some parts, chicken koop). If you live in the northern states where the temperatures are very cold in the winter and where there is a possibility of snow you will want to use a different material than if you are building chickens houses in the south where the chance of snow piling on the roof and causing a collapse is null and void.
In the northern states it is recommended that you build a structure with four completed walls and that you insulate the structure if possible. Do not use Styrofoam insulation for this purpose because these birds love to eat Styrofoam. If you cannot insulate the structure consider having a light bulb in the house that you can leave on during frigid temperatures.
In the southern states where the climate is much warmer you need only three solid walls on your structure and many people only build two solid walls on their chicken houses. The remaining walls are fashioned from poultry wire. The solid walls are constructed to block the north wind from the birds and to block the rain from blowing in from the most likely direction. Some people get more blowing rain from the east and some get more blowing rain from the west. The open side that has chicken wire is to help the birds during the hot and humid summer months when temperatures will often stay close to 90 throughout the night.
Inside of chickens houses you will construct roosting poles for the birds to use at night. The larger breeds of birds will require that you allow approximately ten inches of space for each bird that will be using the roost. The higher that you can place the roosting pole the better. However when you raise the larger breeds they sometimes have difficulty getting on the pole and you may need to construct them a ladder that they can walk up to get to the pole. Their weight frequently makes it hard for them to fly even for these short distances and if they are forced to dismount the roost without the aid of a ladder they can have accidents that cause them to suffer broken legs.
Inside the chickens houses you will also want to establish nesting boxes that the birds can use for their egg production. You need a box for every four hens that you have because these animals actually share the boxes. Do not place the nesting boxes higher than the roost pole. You also need to consider whether or not you will allow the animals to hatch any of their eggs. If you plan to allow them to hatch eggs on occasion the boxes need to be low enough that the chicks can get out of them when they are ready to follow the mother hen
