Do my birds have enough room?

[doublejfarm]

What do you all think? I have a 8x4 coop with an an attached 8x4 run. Its made from a converted wood shed (pics to come). Anyway, I had planned on total free range as we have acreage in the country. But all my three year old wants to do is follow/chase my birds all over.
So until he is older my wife says they must stay in the run unless I am home. I have 7 hens and 1 roo. Do they have enough room?

 

[Noymira]

I think the run might be small if they don't get to free range a lot.

I'd probably use 4' garden fencing and those metal posts and setup a larger "run" for daytime when your home but cannot directly supervise. That way it'd be easy to move as needed and not permanent but puts a barrier between them and the 3 year old.

 

[teach1rusl]

I agree with at least putting up temporary add-on run...they should really have at least around 10 sq. ft. of outdoor space per bird... Even if it's just metal posts and a roll of wire.

 

[doublejfarm]

Ok yeah. Exactly what I was thinking but I didn't want to do it unnecessarily. I was planning on a 10x10 addition. Would that be good enough?

 

[Snack Giver]

I could never confine my 6 birds to only 10x10' of free space. But i guess thats better than what they would get at Foster Farms.

 

[Noymira]

Quote:
If you go by the 10 sq/ft per chicken in the run (the usual suggestion on BYC), then 10'x10' on top of the 8'x4' run would give you 132 sq/ft, enough for 13 chickens technically, but probably very comfortable for the 8 you have.

 

[doublejfarm]

I read in "Backyard Poultry" about a lady that uses that black silt fence that comes on a roll with the posts to temporarily contain her chickens has anyone on here used it. Thoughts. Input. Its cheap to death ($30 gets 100 feet) but would it work?

 

[teach1rusl]

Really, just about anything will contain chickens. You're concern might be better placed with "Would it keep your three year old out?"

And of course if you have dogs around (including the occasional stray), you'll want it to stand up to that. I would strongly suggest you secure them inside at night though, since a temp. fence won't stand up to night time predators for sure. Chicken wire, deer netting, just about anything can be used for temp. fencing.

 

[jinxschuh]

Quote:
I've used it to make an easy/temp play pen for my chicks when they were to small to let free range. I used step down fencing posts so they were easy to put in, easy to move and easy to store. It worked great, even to keep the dogs out while they were still learning that the chicks were family and not snacks.