We supply quality and affordable poultry, livestock, and pet housing that has been specifically designed to accommodate the needs of smallholders, poultry hobbyists, and pet owners. Our animal housing is British-made, using timber sourced from Forest Stewardship Council registered suppliers. Our range includes poultry housing, pet housing (hutches, kennels, pens), field shelters, and other livestock pens.
Call us on 01954 210268 or 07836 587050 and we will work with you to supply the right housing for your purposes.
Why We Choose This Animal Housing
When we first started to keep poultry 20 years ago, we bought a number of different coops and sheds from various manufacturers. This practical experience with a wide variety of the housing available on the market prompted us to firmly eliminate all but one manufacturer from our own list of suppliers. We decided to use only Littleacre Products, having had some disappointing results with other products.
While some of the other animal housing on the market may (on first look) seem cheaper, the quality, longevity, and design of the products is such that they are not cost-effective in our experience. They are generally of much poorer build and component quality, and need to be replaced alarmingly quickly. Most mass-produced, cheap chicken coops (and other pet housing) have felt roofing. Felt roofing is a cheap roofing material, specifically concerning in poultry housing because it is known to harbour Red Mite between the wood and the felt. This makes pest control extraordinarily difficult, unless you’re willing to strip off, discard, and replace the felt regularly. Housing that uses corrugated roofing eliminates this cosy Red Mite hidey-hole, so all of our housing has Onduline corrugated roofing, which makes pest control easier.
When we considered the problems and frustrations created by poor design and low quality products, we rapidly concluded that buying cheap livestock and pet housing was a false economy. We now exclusively use and supply -and are local agents for- the quality and affordable livestock housing designed by Littleacre, manufactured by their family-run business in the Midlands.
Construction Details:
The manufacturer uses high quality materials and construction in all our housing:
- Softwood construction.
- ‘Celbronze’ pressure treated (tanalised).
- Deep rebate cladding and framing.
- ‘Onduline’-clad corrugated roof covering (made from bitumen-saturated organic fibre).
- High level ventilation on all models.
- Solid plywood floor.
- 25 mm square, 16 gauge mesh used for all runs (except The Baskerville that uses 50 mm square, 2.5 mm mesh).
- Galvanised fixtures and fittings.
- All timber is FSC sourced.
Longevity & Maintenance:
Like you, we have busy lives and can’t spend lots of time on the maintenance of our animal housing. We found that our animal housing is robust and low-maintenance but does need some upkeep. We would recommend painting the housing annually with an appropriate and animal-safe exterior treatment. But if you neglect to do so, all is not lost!
We wanted to refurbish a couple of older chicken coops that we have used at the farm since 2011. We rotated the coops out of use so that we could give them some attention and get them back into tip-top shape.
This older chicken coop (first in use in 2011) was a quick refurbishment. We brushed it down with a wire brush, painted it, and replaced the roof covering. It took no more than a couple of hours, and the sheds are now back in use.
[ngg src=”galleries” ids=”8″ display=”basic_imagebrowser”](We have a larger unit (first in use in 2006) in refurbishment that required a little more work. When it’s complete we will post some pictures of the process.)
