Chickens are eating all the grass!

[Rusty's Ranch]

We used to have a lawn - then we got chickens. We live in the city and find the birds are much quieter and happier if we let them free range in the back yard all day. They have a lovely run, but make all kinds of racket if I don't let them out. I don't want to risk angry neighbors, so I cave in and the girls get their way.

At first they were just scratching around in the planter beds, but now they are scratching holes in the middle of the lawn. Currently about 1/2 the lawn is gone - in a couple weeks, we won't have any grass left at all.

Any suggestions on what to plant instead of grass so we can still have a green backyard?

 

[GrannySue]

Welcome to chickenkeeping!
A few suggestions;
- get rid of the chickens (oops, sorry!)
- grow grass and flowers in pots up high so the chickens can't get them
- 2 words - roof garden
- get rid of the neighbours
- move to the country and get a lot more chickens.

 

[kristen2678]

We are dealing with this ourselves. We are trying to find a way of keeping them in a part if the yard that is bigger than their run so they feel like they have more space. The rest of the yard we are going to try and keep lush, then rotate them and seed the other part of the lawn. There are some mixes forsale on line that are a combination of veggies and other green seeds that are nice. Good old fashion grass is great too. All of this needs to look nice, or at least neat. It's hard to keep a balance.

 

[ColoradoMike]

That's a really nice coop/run for two hens. We're fortunate enough to have both a secure coop/run and a much larger 'chicken yard' fenced off from the rest of the yard. We let them 'pasture' in the chicken yard when we're home and vigilant, otherwise they're in the secure run. So, they are allowed to trash the weeds/vegetation and dig through our compost piles in the chicken yard and our lawn/gardens are free from scratching (wow, they are destructive, aren't they?).

I'm a newbie at this, but having seen advice from others, I'd suggest having a few portable planting beds/low pots/tray with quick growing grass/greens that you can put in their run and let them scratch and forage through. If you maintain several, you can rotate them in and they'll always have something interesting to forage through.

 

[ChooksChick]

We had a similar problem. We now have 2 runs, which are a combination of mulch, grass, dirt, and sprouted birdseed. We keep them in one or the other or both or the yard, depending on how decimated each area is.

My neighbors' houses are 15 feet away from ours, but we have backyards 300 feet deep.

The idea of rotating gives them a bit of scenery change, and it allows bugs and things to fill back in. Ideally, we need to decrease the number of chickens...












....HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

 

[Eggs4Sale]

At the time that we had 20 plus chickens free-ranging in the yard, we had a lush 1/4 acre lawn of bermuda and St. Augustine grasses. For about 3 months. The most damage was done in winter when the grass was dormant. We had to cull the chickens, unfortunately, and it took two years for the St. Augustine to recover. I now have 8 hens, 2 geese, and 4 ducks in the yard, and they aren't doing the damage that the 20 plus chickens did. In fact, I need to mow the lawn!

How many chickens do you have? Could you decrease the size and make the grass per chicken ratio more balanced?

 

[Eggs4Sale]

Quote:
That's a good one!

Oh, man, I can barely breathe still!!

 

[Rusty's Ranch]

We only have 2 chickens, so I probably won't be decreasing the number, but you've all given me some ideas. My husband doesn't care that the birds are eating the grass - he hates mowing it and probably wishes it were gone.

Perhaps we'll design some planter beds with hardy plants the chickens won't bother and just lay down gravel or wood chips as walkways. I notice they leave my lavender, mint and rosemary alone. I also read that they aren't real fond of geraniums.

We're going to fence off the veggie garden - maybe they'll stay out of it next year (poor pepper plants - didn't have a chance).

It's all about compromise and trying to live in harmony. We did certain things in the yard for the dogs, it's the least we can do for our girls.

Thanks for all the input

PS: ColoradoMike - I just looked at your page - great setup.

I'm gonna show hubby your chicken yard, maybe we can do something similar.

 

[needafarm]

Thanks for this question. I'm afraid I might run into the same problem. I have three chicks that have a coop and run but prefer to let them have acces to the whole yard. My girls are about 5 wks. How big is your yard? So I can compare it to my size yard and see if this is a problem I might run into. If so oh well just curios.

 

[Rusty's Ranch]

Our lot is 5,000 sq ft - not sure how much of that is back yard. Our house sits in the middle of the lot. It's a good size yard, but not huge.

We just ran into another problem last night. We have a hawk in the neighborhood and apparently this type of hawk (coopers hawk) will take off with a full grown chicken. So now I'm rethinking the free ranging thing. ColoradoMike has a "chicken yard" around his coop/run (check out his page). Looks like a good idea. We might have to do something like this, but put a top of some sort on it to keep the hawk out.