Free ranging pros and cons?

[Gingersnap722]

I have two German Shepherds and they don't mess with our chickens at all. We introduced them to our chicks the day we got them. We taught the dogs that the chicks were part of the family, so they don't chase or attack them at all.

 

[Peckar]

If you can train them that coop is to go at night free twanging is best but you also have to lock up the coop and they can more easily get desieses from other birds but they also hurt each other less I would recommend it

 

[res]

I have free ranged ever since I first got chickens. I could not imagine keeping them any other way. I DO have a spacious coop (8x10) and covered/enclosed "Fort Knox" run (12x20) that they return to each night and get locked in. They are also locked in when the weather is bad - thunderstorms, blizzards, etc.




They are let loose every morning to roam, and rarely leave my 5 acres, even though there are no fences to keep them in. They have thick evergreen and deciduous trees to hide in, as well as 4 trailers (horse, flatbed, enclosed motorcycle, camper) to hide under, and sheds/barns to find shelter in as well. I *did* have an awesome rooster at one time, that did an amazing job of protecting the girls. Unfortunately, he died back in 2011 and I have never found a suitable replacement. I've tried a few other roosters, but they were all major PITA's and were sent down the road.

I do have electric fence surrounding my landscaping to keep them from destroying it. Before the fence was installed, they dug up EVERYTHING and threw mulch everywhere, to the point that the killed the grass that edged the landscaping.




I also have a Border Collie and an Anatolian Shepherd that deter predators.

I have lost ONE bird to a predator - a hawk took a 6-week old chick. So I do not free range the little ones until they are big enough to not be "hawk snacks".

I do not have to hunt for eggs. The hens lay their eggs in the nest boxes, or in the horse's hay barn. Always in the same spot. I am certain of this because my egg count is appropriate for the number of laying hens, and never varies.

 

[Kazfam]

I notice that it makes the whole lot of them more calm.
The rooster crows less if he has been out with the girls doing his rooster-man-in-charge thing with them.

My son lets them out and hangs around them - they tend to follow him so he has no problem keeping an eye on them while he does this or that (usually archery practice).

It is definitely in their nature to free-range and they do love the activity and all the goodies that are out there for them to eat.

 

[DieselHen]

I've taught my dog to ignore them basically. She still loves to watch as they run around, but she's able to control her prey drive, and she's a 75 lb. rambunctious Pitbull!

 

[Phoenixxx]

Regarding the predator thing, I've lost more chickens to predators breaking through my fencing and getting into the coop than I ever have while free-ranging. When they're free, they can escape. In the coop and run, they're easily cornered. I heard a racket one day, and in the few seconds it took me to run up to the coop, the dog inside had killed 3 and injured 3 others. Another time, same thing except they were all lose and the dog managed to get only one in the same timeframe. If daytime predators will be a concern, stay away from frouffy breeds. I have learned the hard way that those cool hairdos severely impact their ability to see what's coming in time to get away. Also, some breeds are better fliers than others; this can be a very handy escape strategy but also means they'll be more difficult to contain when you want them to stay in the coop and run.

As for pros and cons...

Pros: healthier birds because they get a larger variety in their diet
Lower feed bill (you'll notice the difference when winter comes around and the forage disappears under snow!)
Happier chickens
EGGS: the nutritional value goes up exponentially when chickens are foraged and happy!
Free lawn and garden fertilizer applied with zero effort on your part

Cons: "the grass is always greener"... if your property isn't well fenced, be prepared to chase them out of the neighbour's yards!
Poop on the deck
Under every tree will be dustbathing bowls but only on the sunny side.
House chickens. Yep, leave that door open on a nice summer day and it won't be long before you find a chicken in the kitchen!
Sometimes they follow you around when you don't want them to. And then you're late because you didn't want to drive over any chickens that INSIST on being in the driveway!

 

[Davey G]

We let a chicken go broody once and she did fine. She hatched out thirteen chicks. We let here free range and sure enough by the time the chicks were only half a year old over half, (seven) had died by drowning, and getting stepped on. Of course that was with the babies. When we had the adults loose we had a severe dog attack which left me with four of the eleven chickens I had started with. I have never lost a chickens to a hawk and probably never will. Knock on wood. All the attacks have been from hunting dogs that got loose. I'd say make sure your dogs, ( If you have any), are very well acquainted with your chickens. Just a thought.

 

[bruceha2000]

I am fairly new to chickens though I've been lurking here and learning a lot over the past month. I think I'm ready to take the plunge and get some chickens now. I have a fairly large area available and would like to free range my future flock. What are the pros and cons of free ranging? What are your experiences?

It depends on what you mean by 'free range'

To some it means they are out and on their own all the time. To most of us (I think) it means they are locked up at night and can wander during the day.

My chickens get to free range from morning until they go to their coop in the evenings. I have some really happy chickens! Now, they are like kids, they get into everything! I first started free ranging them a couple of strict supervised hours per day and worked them up to all day unsupervised. I do keep them off my deck.
They definitely don't eat as much food. They eat frogs, lizards, crickets and pretty much anything scrap from my kitchen.

Mine as well though I've not seen them eat a frog. And they definitely do not like wooly bear caterpillars.

A large area is a little vague, but any vegetation will be mostly gone with time. They do like to scratch, and will demolish a garden in a couple of minutes. May be hard on ornamental plantings too.

My 10 have WAY more space than they could ever decimate and they seem to wander here and there rather than cleaning out an area. But the point must be taken seriously. If one has plants they do not want the chickens to rip up when looking for bugs, steps must be taken.

Mine get out most days, but I would strongly recommend a run/coup that is big enough that they can stay in lock up if needed.

Agree. I think a lot of people don't consider the possibility that the chickens may have to be locked up for several days.

so I have a question about free ranging a flock that was known to wander. I got them from someone and part of the reason he no longer wanted them was because when he free ranged them- they would cross the street to his neighbors yard. So- besides not trusting my one dog- I am concerned they will jump ship. Any suggestions?

How big an area did they have before, how big now, where are the buildings relative to the lot boundaries?
Our house is close to the road but there is a lilac hedge and "2 rail" fence outside that so it forms a visual barrier to the road even though they could walk right under the fence. Plus there is lots to dig for under the lilac bushes, why go farther?? The door to the lower part of the barn (coop inside) is probably 200' from the road. The house across the street is another 200' from the road. Another 200' from the barn to the road that runs up the side of our lot. Both roads 35 MPH dirt, traffic but not TONS all day like a 55 MPH road. Acres of pasture and woods on the other 2 sides of the barn. They have gone close to the road where the driveway enters but never crossed it, nor gone on it as far as I know. They stick about 100' from any building which I have read here on BYC is pretty typical.

My point is that at least for my girls, they are happy to stay where they are because they have all that they need and the distance from the buildings is within their comfort zone. If your's were in a 50x50 yard, I can see them wandering. If their new boundaries are 100' or more from all buildings, they are probably not going to wander out. See the picture on the last post I quoted here. That would likely be enough to keep your chickens in your yard given you said you have a large area. They seem to mostly follow their beaks to the next interesting looking thing.

I have seen chickens purposefully walking across the road about a mile up. Don't know if they were going home or leaving home. Nor do I know why the chickens crossed the road. Better stuff on the other side? Small area on their side?

The unanswerable question.

Thank you so much for your thoughts and feedback, everyone! I think you have talked me into it. I am going to look for a dog to raise and train with the chickens, to protect them against predators. Thank you for the info on that, centrarchid! I am a little concerned about birds of prey though. I have quite a large area where I'm thinking of keeping the chickens in and letting them roam, but putting up netting for such a large area is going to be very expensive. Is there cheaper alternatives to keep hawks and other birds at bay?

On the fencing, the fence around the area is pretty good, but only about 4 feet tall. Should I clip their wings to stop them flying out and if so, how do I do this? Do I have to cut the primaries, how short, one or both wings? Pics would be very helpful!

I learned early that a 4' fence keeps a chicken on the side it wants to be on

But I would NOT clip, doing so would only limit their ability to MAYBE escape a predator. Most often a chicken will fly to the top of the fence then go over as opposed to flying over in 1 go. You can run a hot wire over the top of the fence on insulators and they probably won't land on that since it isn't a solid object (at least not for chicken size feet). Don't even need to electrify it. Wouldn't do any good anyway, have to be in contact with the wire AND the ground. No doubt you've seen plenty of wild birds sitting on the high voltage lines that would kill us all DEAD if we touched them. But, if you electrify and also run it at the appropriate height above the ground on the outside of the fence, you can deter foxes and dogs as well.

As for hawks, well I'm thinking of getting a Livestock Guardian Dog (LGD). Lost a girl to a predator (probably fox or hawk) in April. I don't think there is ANY way to keep a winged predator out OTHER than covering the sky above your chickens. And that would be REALLY expensive as you noted. So the likely candidate is a watchful guardian which you and I can not be all day every day. We have other things we need to do.

I do have electric fence surrounding my landscaping to keep them from destroying it. Before the fence was installed, they dug up EVERYTHING and threw mulch everywhere, to the point that the killed the grass that edged the landscaping.

Great example of garden protection. People step over, chickens stay away, small visual presence. Not hard or overly expensive. Note how the posts are set back in the mulch. You need to keep the grass from touching the wire or it will get grounded and be ineffective.

My pros echo the others:
- The girls get a natural diet, balanced as each sees fit. They have never had a Momma or mentor to tell them how much oyster shell to eat. Nor how much grit (in the case whatever they find on the ground). But they instinctively know. They eat grass, weeds, seeds, small flowers. The eat worms, slugs, earwigs (some of mine LOVE earwigs) etc. They also eat from their feeder during the day. I trust they are getting a balanced diet and as another poster said, the color of the yolks when free ranging is NOTHING like you'll find in a store bought or 'commercial feed only' egg. And though we give them 'pre compost' all year, the yolks are still noticeably darker, more yellow-orange when they find their own food to a great extent than in the winter.
- They are never bored as they would be in a coop/run situation. They are waiting at the barn door when I go down and all run out. Then they look at me expectantly for treats

If there are no kitchen scraps, the get BOSS and they LOVE BOSS. Then I go rake through the deep litter, check for eggs (usually none in the morning) and leave. They eat their snacks then wander. They hang in the run (alley in the lower part of the barn) during the day, especially when it is sunny, they come and go as they please. They definitely like to be out the last couple of hours before they roost for the night. In the winter they go through about a 50 oz applesauce jar worth of feed a day and they have feed available 24x7. Now I toss that much in every 3rd day or so. Clearly they approve of the 'all you can eat outdoor buffet'.

Cons:
- Yes the predator issue.
- I don't think my girls are getting any disease out in the field. Wild birds come in the barn all the time (OLD barn, they get in even with the doors closed) and go in the coop to dine on chicken food. So whatever mine might get outside is likely brought in by the wild birds anyway.

Bruce

 

[SixChickFlock]

... Is there cheaper alternatives to keep hawks and other birds at bay?

I would think having sheltered areas would help. My girls run through their open space playing and foraging... But they spend most of their range time resting or bathing around under shrubs where I can't find them. There are already more than a dozen favorite spots where they crash.

 

[Nannoo2]

Hi New Egg! We are also relatively new to backyard chicken raising, (June last year) we have a Buff Orpington, 2 Rhode Island Reds, and an Ameracauna. We live in San Diego"s East County, which has all the usual predators, esp. raccoons, so we built our 70 sq ft enclosure with galvanized hardware cloth mesh walls that sink a foot into the ground into concrete. It's framed by 2 x 4's, and has a solarized plastic patio roof. All of this is really buttoned down, we also have motion lights inside the enclosure and around that back area, mostly for us working there after dark. Every day we let the girls out into their yard: 2500 sq ft with three large trees and several large shrubs, irrigation system keeps it cool (summers hit 100 degrees regularly), they also have the compost pile to play in. There's a 6 ft vinyl fence around our property. Adjacent to the chicken yard is our veggie garden, a 6 ft, 1 inch mesh fence separates that from them....in the year that we've had them, NO ONE has tried to fly over that fence...odd, since when we let them into the 'people yard' to hunt bugs, they do get over into the veggies and love to eat them up. I love to watch them mill around, chickens are so entertaining to watch, especially dirt bathing!! I get advice from our local feed store, which hooked me up with DIATOMACEOUS EARTH, which is a Godsend! It comes as food grade, safe to eat if you want (?!?) and is made of tiny phytoplankton exoskeletons which for some reason wreak havoc with critters like mites, fleas, ants, flies.... in general, the best stuff to have around!! We throw it into the coop, compost pile, anywhere the girls might want to bathe. They all seem pretty happy. When they come into the rose garden, they are kicking and scratching around in river rocks, so they must have thighs of champions! Most of their yard has some sort of cover: trees, a covered work bench area, loveseat swing with a canopy, an outdoor perch in the pear tree. I feel pretty good about them having all that cover. We do have some rats in the yard but never found any rat poop in their area ( I think I got them with some rat bait safely tucked away). We can see their area from the house, and can hear any disturbance out there, usually it's the "I just laid an egg" song! I never knew I would get so attached to our girls...I can't imagine life without them! Good luck with yours!