How much grass for 10 chickens to graze without killing the grass?

[LaurelC]

I agree with @Red-Stars-in-RI that the only realistic way to optimize the space is to rotate them using an electric net. If it were me and I were planning a coop and run setup, i'd place it in the middle of the lot with chicken doors on each side, then run electric netting from the coop in a starburst pattern, allowing you to give the birds several different paddocks. This would allow you to shift them through an area quickly if you're in the middle of a drought, or keep them locked in the run if your pasture area needs a break for a while.

 

[hayley3]

I have just 5 hens and they ate ALL of my zoysia in a 10 x 15 ft area! It still hasn’t come back and it’s been a year. I do let the hens out every day into the main backyard to search for bugs etc but they MUST be nipping off the new grass tips as they come up. I have no way to let them on a section so some can grow back and then exchange the pens for awhile.

Where I live now, I planted some clover..they decimated that in one day. The first day it looked cut but the next day they removed root and all.

 

[chooki]

At high time, I had 10 birds in the suburban backyard (roughly 200 - 300 m² lawn) - three adult hens plus seven 3-4 months old pullets/cockerels. The lawn was fine.
My chooks eat the grass, but they only like the tender part - like the tip of grass or new grass in spring.
They are fed three times a day so eating grass is more like the pass-time. It's also an established lawn, roots are holding soil tight together, so it's not easy for the chickens to destroy.

 

[SoCal Chicken Mama]

My chicks love grass and they definitely eat it. I think rotational grazing could work for you. I don't know a lot about free ranging, but I'm planning to graze mine on my back lawn in a chicken tractor with a roof, about 4'x10'', and move it every week or so, to let the grazed grass recover. I only have 4 though. Last week for their first free range experience, I put them in a spent raised bed vegetable garden that is fenced and I put bird netting on top (because I'm afraid of aerial predators). The bed is 3' x 12' and full of juicy weeds and overgrown stuff. They huddled together in one corner for a while until "Buffy the Brave" (Buff Orpington) took a leap of faith and ran all the way across to the opposite corner. Then they all started scratching a bit. Mostly they enjoyed dust bathing up there because the loose soil is about 18" deep. I carried them two at a time from the coop to the garden, one under my arm and one in a small pet crate. But on the way back the one under my arm "Rhody the Runaway" got loose and took off all over the yard. She kept me chasing for 45 minutes! She found lots of places where I couldn't get to her, under overgrown bushes, between plant supports and fences. Eventually she saw the coop and run, and went for it, but she couldn't get in without me, so she let me catch her and put her in the door.

 

[SoCal Chicken Mama]

I think your measurements 134' x 134' is .4 acre, not .2. And I agree with everyone who said you need a mix of grasses and weeds to attract bugs. Biodiversity. Each plant has it's own pest. The lawn I want to graze them on is a mix of Bermuda grass, fescue, clover, dandelion, and other weeds. A pretty "monoculture" lawn probably won't work. I put sod there three times and they all failed, mostly because of those big white C-shaped grubs that eat grass roots. I was hoping the chickens would enjoy them. I haven't found a chicken tractor with a big enough grazing area yet, and I'm afraid a home made one would be too heavy for me to move. I saw a store bought one years ago that was the right size, and 6ft. tall, made of thick wire, and it was constructed so that I could lift up the end with one hand (wheels on the other end.) I have to be careful because I've hurt my back and I can't lift heavy things anymore.