Building with Wood Pallets

Early in 2012 when we were planning for chickens, I was reading through our chicken coop book... 

...trying to figure out a blueprint for our coop. After talking with veteran chicken owners and researching the subject, I knew I wanted a walk-in structure. No crouching for me! Our coop needed to be functional and easy to maintain because we want chickens long term. I also wanted a building that would be big enough to add more chickens to later, if needed. And considering the above, it couldn't be a coop with a built-in run, so that would have to be added on one side. Once I figured out these details, I started making a list of supplies and pricing them.

That's about where my plans came to a screeching halt.

I was a bit despondent for a while, but then I came upon this website, which provided hope and inspiration. It was just so exciting to me to realize there was a free wood resource that could allow us to build the chicken coop we needed without spending $1,000 or more. The site also made me hope we might actually be able to build our own from scratch, with no previous building experience. And it got me excited thinking about other possibilities for building with wood pallets.



This post at BackyardChickens.com was also helpful and inspirational, particularly in helping me envision our attached run.

Plus, I learned that using wood pallets would be an environmentally friendly way to go anyway, since:

• 40% of all hardwood processed in the U.S. is used for pallets
• 2/3 of all shipping pallets are only used once
• 1/4 of wood in landfills is from used pallets

So, a couple months ago we started our project and have been building it ever since. And recently we finally got it to the point we could move our big chicks in.

Stay tuned for progressive pictures...!