Building the ideal chicken run

[Maebh]

My ideal? Not a run at all.
Instead a paddock, broken into quadrants with 200-400 sq ft/bird.
This area would be covered in tri-sections with ladino cover, kentucky grass and amaranth and sunflower stands where the birds live for one season, one section to lay in nitrogenous rejuvenating legumes, and one in garden cultivation.

The perimter of the paddock would be grown in grapes/berries and tall fruiting shrubs. The entire area itself would be fenced with electric wire and farm fence.

This sounds amazing, I have no idea what Kentucky grass is or amaranth but the idea of succession planting including a fallow period of fowl habitation is wonderful. I have a picture in my mind of an irish version and it is wonderful, perhaps something to build towards.

 

[tridentk9]

My ideal? Not a run at all.

Instead a paddock, broken into quadrants with 200-400 sq ft/bird.

This area would be covered in tri-sections with ladino cover, kentucky grass and amaranth and sunflower stands where the birds live for one season, one section to lay in nitrogenous rejuvenating legumes, and one in garden cultivation.


The perimter of the paddock would be grown in grapes/berries and tall fruiting shrubs. The entire area itself would be fenced with electric wire and farm fence.

ROFL- I had the same discussion with a friend that raised parrots. One day we drove by a country club with their tennis courts. VERY tall fences with chain link and shade cloth across the top. Oh my flight cages ;-) And with chain link it might even keep the parrots in. The golf course for those birds that could free flight. The possibilities. Unfortunately we couldn't afford to buy out the country club to convert it to our uses nor even pay the upkeep. But the dreams .........

 

[Davaroo]

Ive moved two years past and now have a small Low area in my yard. It fills to an inch or so with water during really severe rains. I stuck a small kitchen garden there without realizing this, simply as an expedient.

But the spot is not a dead zone... grasses and weeds flourish there, and it percolates the water away quickly. So my plan now shifts.
My next move now is to relocate the garden to higher ground (in the works) and fill the low spot with grasses, rabbit eye blueberries, azaleas, lantana, trellised grapes or woodbine - a mix of native and hardy forage, shrubs and perennials that can tolerate a sub par location. I'm investigating now a few hummingbird attractor plantings for the slot, since they don't compete with the chickens for food.
This "mini-jungle" will be a chicken run and shelter spot for the birds. I can funnel them there from the main garden area using wire mesh "chunnels" and let them run amok. Meanwhile, I can grow useful and decorative things there.
My whole yard is slowly being fenced and electric tape is next for terrestrial pred protection. The shrubs and trellised plants give protection from aerial invaders.
I had a similar scheme once before that worked well.

 

[thetigress]

I too am new to the whole chicken raising thing. I live in Ohio and our Chicken run was like what your first one did. We placed metal stakes in the corners and one in the center of each side, hooked the fencing to it and left it a little wobbly as well. The reason for this is that if anything tried to climb it the fencing would bend over them and trap it so it could not get in the run. We have seen it work with raccoons for that we have it also the same way around our garden. We placed our coop and run away from any trees so that no animal can climb the tree then jump into the run area as well. If you want to design your coop run bigger you defentally need to place more stakes on each side of the run as well.

 

[PEIchickenlady]

Great tip about the door! We are building our run now. We are going to do this.

Here's a picture of part of our run (it's not finished in this picture but gives you an idea):

It's a lot like Wynette's except that we buried our 1" chicken wire almost 18" into the ground.   We also used cement with our 4x4 posts and spaced them 8 and 1/2 feet apart.   Our run is six feet high so we can walk into it, I don't have it covered at this point as I have goats in with my chickens and the hawks have thus stayed away.  (Not to mention the dogs and cats "guarding" the place.  /img/smilies/big_smile.png


I am making a separate run for my chicks that will be covered since hawks are far more likely to go for them than the adult hens and the goats won't be in with them.


I used 2x4 welded wire only because I can't afford hardware cloth.  I did use hardware cloth over all windows into the coop.


This second picture shows what we did under our run gate:  that will likely be your weakest link so this was our solution.   It's worked great -the gate doesn't get caught on anything and nothing can dig under it as we poured the cement about 18" deep also.

 

[Becketts quacks]

I love your post and especially your ideas about recycling the inside areas. However, I have ducks, and I have a great idea for their "pond" (on a raised area with a ramp up to it and a plug at the bottom), but also need plan for building a fence. I want to use wood poles and probably the plastic poultry fencing. I have dogs that watch out for the ducks so nothing gets in. They are secured in my back yard with an underground fence. One of the dogs is a jack russell, and he can hear a snake crawling through the grass, a shrew in it's tunnel. I have no rodents, opossum, snakes or fox because of him.
I currently have a 50' x 25' area fenced in around the front of two 10' x10' x6' kennels to allow the ducks some area for exercise, and foraging. It is with metal fence posts I got from my brother and poultry wire. What I would like to do is build a nice duck yard, that is divided to allow for one to rejuvenate while they are foraging living in the other, and I love the idea of maybe relocating them down by the blackberry bushes so they can get some of the fruit. I have ideas for a green leafy garden for them this year. My idea, based on what I've seen in the area, is a wood fence with poultry plastic fence, and a gate! I'm not a carpenter, but I can certainly follow directions, and I live near a Lowe's. Does anyone have a link to a plan for building this type of fence?

 

[Gypsi]

These are big ideas. I like the amaranth in the rotation, might try that

 

[justin7]

Okay so here is a photo of my chicken coop! We turned our shed into a chicken coop. We haven't used it in a few years.. So I said why not get some chickens! It measures 8ft X 8ft. I went in a little to make room for the feed and supplies. So the chickens living space in there is 4ft Wide by 8ft Length... That is a little small so I am going to add a level in there with a ramp to make it have a little bit more room for all of our 22 birds (18 chickens, and 4 ducks). Sadly we lost a duck tonight . Here are a few photos of the coop.

Our feed storage and supplies space.

I laid ply wood down up top, just to make a place to store the hay that we use for our bedding.

The door way to get into my babies living space

Okay now my question is, how big should I make the exterior run? I was thinking about keeping the Length 8 ft off of the chicken coop. Then going out 20 feet. Is that a good enough size for all of our fur babies? Currently they are all 8 weeks old, and I do not want to redo this thing. Lol. Any suggestions will help tremendously, and during the day time tomorrow I will post a photo of the space I am going o build the chicken run. Thanks in advance, and I am sorry if I have confused anyone...

 

[ChickenAndMore]

Yall have some great ideas. I am building a new run and this thread has really helped me. Thanks everyone!

 

[Sane]

Here's ours -