Building A Chicken Birdhouse

My sister has a birthday coming up. While in our printer room folding plans for our online woodworking plans store Woodworkersworkshop.com, I was folding a plan for a chicken birdhouse and had a lightbulb moment. We should build her a chicken birdhouse. LOL. Only makes sense if you know that they have chickens. Lots of chickens.

I ran the idea by Jim and he was on board so we printed out an extra copy of the chicken birdhouse plan and hung it on the wall until we were ready to build it.

First thing we had to do was select the wood. In the woodyard we have a multitude of “cants” or logs that we have squared up removing the bark on the sawmill, but not yet sliced into boards.

We chose one and cut it into boards on the sawmill. We needed a 1 x 10 inch board for the birdhouse. Then Jim used the circular saw to cut an 6 foot section off one of the boards.

Then it was back to the workshop to begin our chicken masterpiece.

We took the board and squared off the ends on the miter saw.

The plan has each piece drawn full size with measurements as well as a layout for the pieces on the board to minimize wastage.

We traced each piece right off the plan onto the wood using tracing paper.

I started cutting out the irregular shapes on the bandsaw…

…while Jim did the straight cuts on the table saw, then drilled the holes. The front hole is the entrance and the back hole is for air flow and hanging.

After sanding…of course there is always sanding involved…Jim started the assembly using glue and brad nails.

Starting to look like a chicken!!

One last thing to do in the workshop…eyes. This chicken needs eyes. The plan calls for black plastic eyes and that would be wonderful but we decided to make ours from wood.

Jim took a length of dowel and rounded the end on the sander.

Looks promising.

Then sliced the dowel on the bandsaw.

We simply glued the eyes in place and then it was time for paint. I used exterior grade paint in the hopes it will last longer. I started by applying 2 coats of Zinzer 123 to try and block any knots from bleeding through the paint. Once that was dry I could start with the actual paint.

First I painted anything staying white…white. Then I painted everything that was going to be yellow…yellow. LOL

Next I painted 3 coats of red (!!!!) and then the brown. Always the red that needs more coats than the rest.

Now remember those dowel eyes. They got painted black.

Ready to see him.

Here is the back view…

Here is a picture of him where you can see his “wings”.

Once all paint had dried, I sprayed him with a non-yellowing outdoor project clear coat, just to try and make him last longer.

That’s it for this project. If you don’t have or like chickens (what’s wrong with you) you could always build one of the other numerous birdhouses from the plans we sell in our online store…and have fun.

Later.