Which poultry house or chicken shed you should choose depends on a number of factors:

1. How much space do you have
2. How many chickens do you have
3. How much money do you have

For people with the space to tuck a monstrosity away and/or with lots of spare time, there are plans available to enable you to build your own poultry house. Alternatively you could do as I did, and cut a hinged flap into the side of a small garden shed. Put up an old broom handle on some brackets as a perch, and provide a couple of plastic boxes full of sawdust for nesting in, and 'ta daaa! One chicken shed and happy chickens!

There are lots of factors you can take into account when deciding on a poultry house, but two really key things when looking at chicken sheds are:

• security from predators
• good circulation of fresh air to prevent diseases and rotting of wood.

Take care of these and the rest is largely down to personal preference.

Size matters when choosing a poultry house, not only because it needs to fit in your garden, but also because if you have limited space you are more likely to spend a lot of your time staring at the chicken shed out of the living room window. Those people lucky enough to have larger gardens can tuck an ugly old hen house out of sight, but if the chicken shed is going to be a prominent feature of your garden then it is worth investing in something a little more aesthetically pleasing than an old shed with a flap in it.

Hand made wooden chicken sheds now come in all sorts of different styles - you can get them painted (make sure the paint is robust enough for outside, and safe for the birds) and you can find ones that look like little houses or chalets - even castles!

However, a beautiful poultry house is lovely but unless your garden is completely secure, and you can let them free range, you will still need a chicken run for the hens to scratch about in. Be wary of assuming you can contain chickens in a garden with a bit of mesh fencing. Mine are astonishing escapologists, much to the annoyance of my neighbours. They find a way out into next door's garden and love to kick up the gravel into their perfectly manicured borders. They also love to wriggle under the mesh protecting my vegetable patch, and eat all my hard work!

So, a chicken run is a good idea, and many of the beautiful hand made poultry houses are not easily compatible with chicken runs, or you may have the frustration of a gorgeous chicken shed surrounded by an ugly weldmesh frame chicken run - what a waste.

 A good solution for keeping chickens in a limited space is an Eglu.  The Eglu is a plastic chicken coop.  The smaller original version has a plastic coop a little bit like a guinea pig hutch, with a secure run which attaches to it.  They appear expensive, but come with a great deal of support (and even come with the chickens too if you live close enough to the headquarters) and are a good option for first time chicken keepers.  They hold their value well should you come to sell.  Many people start off with an Eglu for 2 or 3 hens and then find that chicken keeping is an addictive hobby and they upgrade to an Eglu Cube - the larger version, so they can keep a few more feathered friends.

Eglus have a sort of 'city chic' style all of their own.  If your home is more rustic, a chicken ark in wood is the perfect solution.  It is an all in one hen house with nest box, perch, and run all combined in a prism-shaped ark.  These usually have handles so that you can move the ark around the garden to give different areas of your lawn a break.  It is important to read the manufacturers recommendations for the number of birds each house can hold - especially if you are not able to let the chickens out to free range.  Remember you are trying to provide a better and more spacious and humane option than the commecial chicken farm!

Traditional chicken arks appear pricey until you investigate the price of weldmesh and building your own coop.  Chicken wire is not strong enough to withstand foxes - you need proper mesh, and by the time you have costed up all the materials and your time, you may decide an ark or equivalent is the cost-effective solution.

5 top tips for keeping chickens