Do my hens have enough space? Do i need a roof?

[TJAnonymous]

Don't discount vertical space in your coop. I have an 8' x 10' coop for 35 birds. I have a 3 ft wide ladder roost and 3 other roosts that are each 6 - 8 ft long... While I didn't plan it this way, I've discovered that my chickens (especially the roosters) like to also use the rafters as roosts too. So the birds all have their own little groups that they snuggle with but there is LOTS of room when you look at the space vertically.

 

[linguini]

I'm in the planning phase of a coop and run for 6 standard size chickens. I definitely want a 6x6 coop, so I have room to grow the flock up to 9-10 if needed in the far future. My dilemma is with the run. I'm not currently comfortable with free ranging as we do not have a fence around our property, and I see hawks and owls almost daily it seems. We have coyotes, raccoons, snakes, and the rogue dog or two every now and then. Plus, neighbors on the other side of the creek a couple hundred ft away. I was thinking of a 12x12 run, but I'm beginning to worry about the budget. I'd like to have a roof covering at least half the run, but is that necessary or would netting over top be okay? Would a 10x10 be sufficient for 6 hens or would i need to downsize flock?

We started out with a small commercial coop when they were chicks and built an 8x8x8 cube run connected to the coop. It's fairly inexpensive. We used 4x4, 2x4 and 2x2 lumber for the cube construction, chicken wire and hardware mesh for the wall and surrounded the entire perimeter with 18" hardware cloth stapled to the ground, and 18" above ground around the walls of the cube) for predator proof. The chooks were happy inside the cube for a while. When we started to let them out of the cube for play time, the hawks came watching even with us standing around.

So we extended the day-time run with multiple metal t-studded fence posts (~$6 each) and deer net for the fence, and cover the entire run with bird net to keep the hawks out. (bird nets are cheaper than deer net and pretty strong. Do not get garden net, that tears easily).

After several severe rain and snow storm, we had a hard time keeping the ground in the cube dry. Eventually we added tarp inside the top of the cube to keep snow and rain out, and wrapped up the cube with clear vinyl table cloths, leaving about one foot on top open for ventilation. (I connected 4 clear vinyl table cloths- it turned out to be cheaper than all other alternatives). The cloths were screwed to the cube with paint stir strip so they won't get blown apart by strong wind. I also added 6 bags of dry, play sand (50lb/bag, less than $5 per bag) to keep the ground dry. It worked much better than chopped straw. Do not get washed sand, they come wet and you'll never get them dry!

I also made a divider fence/net to divide the extended run into upper and lower lawn, hoping to control the lawn health, will find out if that works in spring!

The entire project just kept growing on its own. It's quite a learning experience. We just purchased another commercial coop to add to the compound - the chooks have grown too big even though they all managed to get on the roosting bar at night.

ps. We have 8 birds, was planning to give two to my friend, but he never came to get them and I became too attached to all of them!

 

[My Pretty Pekins]

I couldn't add much to what others have said - other than personal experience with runs...

...we didn't bother with a roof for the first couple of years and let me tell ya, the rainy seasons were absolute nightmares and no jokes. So I would say definitely get at least part of it sheltered, and ideally do that in the area you'll frequent most. Hope that helps!

 

[linguini]

x2. Adding new birds takes up space, so even minimum of 4/10 is going to be tight when you decide to add more. And budget-wise, it's less painful to build to the size you will need, than to have to keep making alterations along the way.

Totally agree - plan big from the start. It's hard to do patch work later - we learned a hard lesson. Every layer we added, made it eve more difficult to modify later.

 

[Alaskan]

Even though you said you were set on a 6x6... since lumber often comes in 8 foot lengths... it might cost almost the same as a 6x6. Just with a 6x6 you will be trimming all of the ends.

Having the part of the run that is against the coop, be roofed, and fully predator proof makes a world of difference.

Then that fully secure run(and yes,more expensive, because hardware cloth costs a fortune), can be attached to a less secure much larger run.


For cost cutting i have found fantastic stuff on
: free pages on local Craigslist
: free pages on local Facebook
: construction trash piles at the dump.

 

[linguini]

Even though you said you were set on a 6x6... since lumber often comes in 8 foot lengths... it might cost almost the same as a 6x6. Just with a 6x6 you will be trimming all of the ends.

Having the part of the run that is against the coop, be roofed, and fully predator proof makes a world of difference.

Then that fully secure run(and yes,more expensive, because hardware cloth costs a fortune), can be attached to a less secure much larger run.


For cost cutting i have found fantastic stuff on
: free pages on local Craigslist
: free pages on local Facebook
: construction trash piles at the dump.

That's a really good point! In fact, that's why we have a 8x8x8 cube for the run and attached it to the coop. Our chooks only go to the coop for sleeping and nesting. Had to go with 8x8 because that was all we could manage skill-wise! We have no other tools such as power saw. Staple gun and power drill were all we had!