Getting back into chickens

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kvanconant

kvanconant

In the Brooder
5 Years
Feb 10, 2014
33
1
24
Hello,
My name is Kevin.
My wife and I decided we wanted to build a coop and get some chickens. We live in city limits but luckily our rules allow to have hens but no roosters.

I took over a family farm back when I was in High School when a family member passed away. We had on average 40-45 chickens.
Issues happened and a family member sold our farm out from under me and now my wife and I were able to get chickens again.

We bought 5 Silkie pullets 2 days ago, 2 Heritage hens and 1 Brahma pullet yesterday.
We bought 2 Silkies and were given 2 more pullets and 1 rooster which were trying to sell now.

I have a 4' x 8' coop That I have built.
I had a question about the run.

The run is 4' long and 8' wide in front of the coop.
Should I extend the run a little more? All 8 chickens go out in the run and peck around but I didn't know if I maybe should extend the run out further?
We are getting rid of the rooster and maybe one more of the Silkies.

Thanks,
Kevin
 
Welcome to BYC! This is a helpful article regarding the space chickens need: https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/how-much-room-do-chickens-need also, keep an eye on the interactions between Silkies and non crested chickens, since the Silkies can't see very well they tend to be picked on by other chickens. I had a couple of Silkies with my flock and had to re-home them due to bullying. Good luck to you.
 
Hello Kevin. Welcome to BYC!!!
If you can afford (meaning land/ supplies) to extend your run you should. The more room you can give them the healthier the flock. Good Luck....
 
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More is always better, so if you can afford to make more space, I would. Chickens get cranky sometimes and more space keeps them from picking on each other.

Enjoy BYC!
 
Thank you for all the replies.
I will see about extending the run maybe another 4' this weekend to give an 8'x8' run.
We also will let them free roam in our back yard. We have about a quarter acre where the chickens are and I am going to give them a few hours a day to run the back yard.
We want a healthy flock so i'll go bigger with the run.
Because my coop and shed sit so close together i'm thinking about fencing in probably 5'x5' of my shed and making an opening for the chickens to go into the shed also. Maybe put their nests in their and that will be easy access for eggs being the shed doors are under my car port.
I might be over thinking the chicken plans but I want them to be healthy and happy.

We were told to keep a close eye on them until we were sure they all got along.
The guy we bought the Heritage hens from had a few breeds together and they did well together, he told us they should do good together but to keep a close eye to make sure the Silkies don't get bullied. So far so good but they have only been together for a day.
My wife is a stay at home wife so she is checking on them every so often. I might install a security camera on the corner of my shed and point it on the coop and run to see if we can watch them inside also to help keep on eye on them.

Thanks for the pointers and info
 

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