You may want your pet chicken to roam around the house, even sleep in the bedroom but the chicken would pretty much prefer its own coop to roost and its own nest box to lay eggs on. You can always build one using the materials that you already have or are readily available at a local farmers market or hardware. Plywood will be needed in building wall cladding, flooring, cladding battens, doorstops, parts of nest boxes, roofing and litter boards, and tarpaper for under roofing. Hardware Feeder system Tips for Building the Chicken House Chickens have virtually no defense against predators. Due to this, the do-it-yourself chicken house must be built in such a way that even when there are boards or planks for flooring, it will still be wise to add chicken wires under the floor to discourage rodents from entering the coop as they could easily chew through the wood. While these are more sought out for meat consumption, there are still a lot of breeds out there that you can choose from. The internet is chock full of information about breeds, so it is imperative to do a bit of research to decide on what type of chickens you want to keep for its meat. You have two choices when purchasing chickens. It goes without saying that you need to pick one that is young, more preferably a one-day old chick. This gives the bird ample time to get domesticated and get used to being handled by people. The birds won't "fly the coop" and be predisposed to hurt anyone every time people get close to them. While at it, do not trim the wire at the top portion of the fence. Leave it rugged. Use the GI sheets as further protection between the posts where you nail your chicken wire. Nail also thick wire fencing around the portion of the wood with signs of wear to discourage chewing. Chicken fencing such as this would not win you a prize for best chicken fence design. When there is evidence of red mites in the area, a chicken bath in Malathion could cure the chicken but all hiding places of the red mites must be disinfected if not burned. Scaly-leg mites You will find scaly-leg mites in between the scales of the leg of the fowl. Once they penetrated the scales, the scales would lift and will cause lameness in the chicken.