This is the exact response from Mark Dobbs in reference to the schoolbus chicken coop.

Katie,

First you need to go to www.dobbshillfarm.com to understand our concept behind the famous chicken bus.The bus is moblie,not a building.Hens range in the pasture,they are not feed in the bus,thats why we have a capacity of 250 per bus you couldn`t do that with a permanent bus building,to many.Hens range all day and only go into lay eggs and roost at night.In the winter they go back to the barn . Some changes have been made since our first bus.Buses no longer have engines,our second bus we bought without a engine.We move the buses with a tractor.Buses set side by side.Each bus has a portable netting around them to keep the hens in.I wouldn`t use a bus or a travel trailer for a permanent building. As for Mr.Tacky I would rather see a yellow bus in a green lush pasture with hens ranging free and having a good time,then a subdivison of houses on concrete,talk about a eye sore. We use buses because we are a low input sustainable farm and its an excellent marketing tool in the city.We call it the yellow egg moblie housed by educated hens,our customers love it .We show the city kids pictures at our farmers market. You may pass this on to your magzine forum.For up dated pictures send $2 and s.a.e.

Thats all folks,

Mark Dobbs 5901 Holladay Rd. Hillsboro,Oh.45133

-- Katie S (cashcrop90@yahoo.com), February 14, 2002

Answers

THANKS Katie for the update on school bus as a chicken coop.I did post the question a while back on the forum asking the question and got a lot of comments on the subject and when spring gets here I will be getting a bus for around $400 dollars complete, I am sure I will find it more profitable than building a coop of that size. Thanks for the post. MARY

-- Mary (marwel@microserve.net), February 15, 2002.