The "over engineered" nest boxes

I got a LOT of grief from my friend Bill of the Matrix Compound about the time and energy I spent on the nest boxes for my chickens. That's where to quote of "over engineered" came from. But I enjoy working with wood and I like giving the projects a little kick of style in a tongue in cheek way. I did that with my Victorian styled chicken coop in the north GA mountains too. I took a long time building this set of boxes. And I was even more excited that I used a lot of recycled lumber. That was one reason it took so long but I saved a ton of money in doing so. I just looked at receipts and it cost me $11.00 in total building this set of nest boxes. Not bad eh?

I had pictures of the earlier steps but they came out looking like a pile of wood debris so here's later in the process

The pieces go together ... and I guess Shadow and Hunter approve! I hope that's a good sign that the chickens will use it, hmmm or not!

I even used old paint and a $2.00 "Ooops!" paint mix from Walmart. The colors are washed out but the light color is a cream and the darker is a sage green

The final masterpiece! And the first egg got laid in the cadillac nest boxes the very next morning. When I check the birds before bed many of the boxes are being used to sleep in. My two young pullets even share the same box.