Free Roaming Chickens

[Pickles03]

Off Topic - but I just had to respond to the one comment BigDaddysMom made....about the granddaughter and her "tent" the dog kennel.

We have dogs - but no small kid (grown) but every single little kid of every single friend we have wants to climb into the dog kennel - with the dogs
and have us lock them in. They think it is hysterical.

 

[BlackBrookPoultry]

My kids always liked being locked in the dog kennel too. I took pictures once and my husband was concerned that it might look like we were abusing them. She had a smile on her face, come on!

As for free ranging - my chickens are free to roam wherever they want. We have 25 acres that they can take over. They only use about 3 acres of it though. They go in the coop on their own every night and I shut the door. I have a very aggressive rooster that I keep around, because I've accepted that that's just the way he is. I know he'll try his hardest to protect his hens from predators. I don't supplement light in the winter to force them to lay eggs. I don't butcher my hens when production goes down either. I have a pen attached to the back of their coop. Once in a while we get friends coming to duck hunt on the river we live on. Most of them have dogs that would love to get a hold of a chicken or one of my ducks. This is usually the only time they get locked up. Chickens are natural foragers. They spend their whole day scratching around and searching for seeds, plants and insects. Mine get stir crazy in the winter because they have their big feeder to eat out of and nothing else to do. A whole life like that probably kind of sucks! My chickens aren't anything expensive or fancy. If I had something like that for breeding I may do things a little different.

My advice is to let them out with supervision at first. If they do ok let them roam out in your yard every day, or at least once in a while. Be prepared to lose one to a predator some day. It happens.

 

[chicks47]

We used to allow ours to free range during the day but they were pulling all of the mulch from our flower beds (as chickens do while looking for bugs) and were not very friendly with our vegetable garden. Also they ventured out of our 4 acres on both sides to our neighbors yards. I did not receive complaints from them but did not want to chance it. We did have some chickens and indian runner ducks go missing with no clue as to their were abouts so there was some loss. So we built a larger combined penned area for the chickens and ducks. They do get sun, grass and to be chickens each and everyday. I have been fencing off large areas to replant grass since they do tend to tear that up.

Sounds familiar!

Lots of interesting stories on this thread. I was looking for the best way to contain my chickens in the yard. I hate to have to but..
we are on a 3/4 acre lot. Our almost 1 year chickens have always free ranged in the day, pretty much every day. We had spoke with our neighbors prior to getting them. We do not have a fence around the yard and my husband refuses to do so. So the girls have wandered to the neighbors and I just got the word from one that 'the wife' doesn't want the chickens over there any more, plus they just got a dog. I totally understand.

So I am looking for a way to let them range in a portion of the yard, but I guess to contain them. Has anyone made a mobile ranging cage type thing? I would like to be able to move them so they don't destroy the area of being contained to one area only. But it would need to be something simple to assemble, or move as a unit. We would have to let them out into the unit each day, but then if it is not connected to the coop, they cannot return to lay at their own desire. I believe the best answer is to fence our yard in, but if anyone has some other suggestions I would love to hear the possibilities.

Other notes to our chickenworld:
We had 5 hens, the coop is a 4x5 steel house sitting about 2 feet off the ground with chicken wire around the base so the girls can come down, even if we need to be gone they are locked in more or less. One day not too long ago, I was gone past dark and the girls were out, my husband and oldest son left and did not lock them up. When I returned home, about an hour after dark, I went to check on the girls only to find a raccoon in the coop! Oddly enough we have had them exposed past dark in times past, but this time we weren't so lucky. Sadly we lost two (one my favorite). We also knew that it is possible for something to happen sooner or later.
So now we are more diligent about locking them up at dusk. We don't sit out and watch them all day, who has time for that! They are out and we look for and check on them every so often.
We had a hawk attack once. But the girls scurried to safety. We have seen coyotes in the day too. So we know there are risks out here.
Our girls do wander to the neighbors and we have been lucky with them all too. Everyone has been friendly, but that can only last for so long.. and I get it. So it is because of the neighbors we need to lock them up.

We will be adding to our flock this spring and will also need to work on joining all the girls together eventually, so something else we will need to plan as we plan the containment situation.

Okay.. thanks for any thoughts.​

 

[weazel922]

It all depends on what you want. I only have 5 chickens, so I don't really want to lose one. Therefore they are monitored and locked in a coop at night. My friend (who has about 3,000 acres), has around 200 chickens (and raises buffalo). He lets them free range and doesn't even have a coop. They fly into the trees at night to roost!

The difference is if one of his chickens comes up missing, he wouldn't even notice. If one or two of mine does, we don't have enough eggs for breakfast everyday.

(And yes I'm jealous of him, how sweet is that to have tons of chickens that live free and protect themselves naturally!!!!)

 

[chickbird]

Mine Free Range From Early Morning Till They Go To Roost. We Have A 42 Inch Chain Length Around Our 4 Acres And The Chickens Do Not Get Out Or Fly Over And Their Wings Are Not Clipped. Your Chickens Will Be So Happy If You Let Them Free Range And Will Look Forward To It Everyday. They Will Reward You With More Eggs Of A Higher Quality And You Will See The Difference It Makes In Their Lives. Chickens Are Forgers And Love To Work And Look For Food. I Do Keep My Feeders Full For Them TO EAT AT THE BEGINNING AND THE END OF THE DAY.

 

[chickfamilyonsleepyhollow]

We have a six foot fence around the backyard (less than a 1/2 acre) 3 sides are stockade and one side is chain link - our six girls get sooo excited when we let them out of their run and seem very happy roaming around the yard ... every once in a while we'll get a flock of turkeys fly in and roost on the fence and wander around the yard but I haven't seen our girls try to copy them ... only once did one of our girls get on the otherside but it was because we had a chair up against the fence (note to self they will climb on anything) .... We love having them free range and like a clock they go back into the coop at sunset ... with that said -- our biggest problem is the digging

they are sooo cute to watch but incredibly destructive so we only let them roam for a couple of hours late in the afternoon.

 

[chickpeaz]

I'm really torn about this. We have about 25 hens right now and another 30+ on the way this spring. Right now they all roam freely for the better part of the day (around 10 AM till dusk) and then return to the barn. We have about 14 cleared acres but they seem to stick to about 3 acres' worth of the property, mostly around the house and barn. Predation has not been a problem other than one hawk attack late last fall (the chicken won

). Unfortunately, we have two issues: 1) the barn is directly across the road from the house, so they are back and forth across the road many, many times a day and 2) the front porch is just above ground level with no railing, and they spend a great deal of time visiting, resting, and pooping on the porch!

The road is not terribly busy and we've only lost one bird in two years to a vehicle accident, and that was a clearly drunken, non-local speeder on a holiday weekend. The neighbors all kindly slow down for chickens in the road. But the messy porch is a much bigger deal to me. I have not yet found a way to deter them from hanging out right outside the front door. Several times a day I have to shoo one particular Blue Andalusian away because she insists on pecking and devouring the foam weatherstripping! I have a difficult time keeping the kids' shoes clean and let's face it, it's just NASTY when the UPS man has to dodge smelly chicken splats to get to my door, or when someone comes to buy eggs and takes home a stinky reminder of where they came from on the bottom of their shoe.

Because of the location and positioning of the barn, I would only have a small area that I could fence for them. I can't imagine it being big enough for this crew that has been happily free-ranging for the last 3 years. Even if we put a railing on the porch (which would really not suit the style of the house) I fear they'd just perch on it and poop over the side anyway. It's just a troublesome situation that I didn't really consider when we brought home our first bunch of birds.

I love my flock, I love their barn...I just wish there were a way to enclose a run for them.

 

[ARose4Heaven]

I have an acre of "chicken pasture" with a 3 foot fence, bordered by 20 acres of cow pasture. This is all surrounded by electric fence. If a chicken flies toward the calves, she's fine, but the other direction over the fence, she better know how to get back in...and fast! My dogs are predators that respect the wire that bites, but anything on the outside of it, is supper.

 

[keetsms]

I lost two while free roaming in the past four years, one a horse stepped on and the other I believe to a cat. I since have added a roo to the flock and have not lost any. He is very protective and I have seen him run a stray dog off. Free roaming has it's risks but I think the health benefits for the birds outweights them.

 

[macdoogle]

I live in the city, San Diego, and my property is on a canyon. My coop is at the bottom of the property with a run with netting over the top. The intire property is fenced. We have a pair of hawks that live in tall Eucalyptus trees in the canyon. I let mine free range only when I'm home. I love it when I see them walking around the back yard/ slope. I feel like I'm really giving them the life. If I hear a hawk screeching I go running. I have to say I am extremely jealous of all of you who have acres plus acres. Alas, some day...I currently have 7 hens plus 3 chicks in a brooder. More eggs to go into the bator tomorrow. Somebody on here said something about 'chicken math'