You do need to check with the town to see what restrictions there may be with regard to how far your coop and run can be from the property line. Some places have more restrictive rules than others. I would bet that the pipe you show in the video is an official survey marker. Also, if you can free range them some, you will need to put up some sort of fencing to keep them out of the neighbor's yard. Chickens don't understand lot lines, they go where ever they spot something that might be food. And most chickens can easily get over a 4' fence if they want to. My chickens are MOSTLY pretty quiet, except they tend to sing the "egg song" after they lay an egg. Some are quick about it, some go on and on and on. "SHUT UP CHICKEN, I get it, you laid an egg, thank you".
And as for chickens and sunlight, yes they like light but at least MY girls hang out under trees, lilac bushes, the deck, in the barn etc when the sun is high. They are hardly ever out in full sun except early and later in the day when the sun is lower. Thus I wouldn't worry about the amount of shade in the areas you are considering for the run. I would think hard about putting any part of it in the woods simply because you will find is a huge PITA to dig holes for the posts. All those trees have .... ROOTS!
Since you mentioned hawks several times, you might want to run fishing line crisscrossed over the top of the run.
There is nothing at all wrong with a dog kennel run! Plenty strong to keep out predators, just make sure you do the 1/2" hardware cloth up ~2 feet. Raccoons can reach through chicken wire and rip the heads off chickens. And have the "no dig" skirt (that green 2x4 wire would work
).That might be your first run, especially since you already have the kennel. If you use the "one side of the garage" location, the kennel will make a larger run. And having it where you can easily get to it in the winter is a BIG plus. I seriously doubt you will have smells that get to the house from the side of the garage. The pine shavings in the coop soak up the moisture from the chicken poop. I have about 6" of shavings in my coop and just rake through it every morning to mix the poop in. If you do that, make sure there is a removable board across the door (and chicken door) or a lot of the shavings will end up outside the coop. BTW, composted chicken poop and pine shavings make good fertilizer for the garden.
An alternative to the skirt is placing paver stones around the outside edge. As I read it, canines don't think "hey if I dig out here I can tunnel under the stones" they want to dig right at the fence. So if you happen to have a bunch of those hanging around use them. Or if in all the "stuff" you have, you happen to have some old metal roof panels, use those instead of wire or fencing as "no dig" skirting. Attach just above ground level, flex it and bury it several inches down. Just make sure it STAYS buried. Don't want to catch the edge of that with feet or mowers. You can use zip ties to attach the hardware cloth but they age out in the elements and get weak. I would just use pieces of wire. It is plenty cheap and I bet you have something around already. For instance, if you have some Romex type house wire, you can strip out the conductors and use the copper wire.
You will find many nice cattle panel hoop runs on BYC. Hoop coops too! You do NOT need to make the entire run out of 1/2" hardware cloth! You do need to make sure predators can not get in. And the hoop runs can be extended easily. They usually have a wood frame base and some metal rods driven into the ground to hold that in place and the cattle panels are attached to the wood frame base. Cattle panels are usually 16' long and 48" high so each panel makes a run section 4' long and 6 to 8 feet wide depending on how much headroom you want. You can put a tarp over the top (clear or translucent is good because it lets in a lot of light) so the chickens can be out in the run without getting rained or snowed on. And you can roll up the sides of the tarp on nice days and in the summer. Some people get fancier by framing in the end with wood and putting a people door in it. Others wrap the tarp around and tie it though I think that would be a PITA every time you need to go in and hard to keep closed in winter winds.
You ARE quite the night owl! You chickens WILL need you to get up and let them out but since you are likely going to be asleep, think about an auto chicken door. They are kind of expensive, I have a PulletShut and it is great. BUT search for "car radio antenna chicken coop door". Cheap if you can get one at a junk (sorry, they are now called "salvage") yard. Put it on a timer and you don't have to get up early. The chickens will put themselves back in the coop at night after they learn that is "home".
Re winter water. That is a problem up here in the cold climates. No the nipples will not keep it from freezing, in fact the water can freeze as drops from the nipple when the chicken drinks and lock it up tight. There are examples of where people have put a piece of rigid insulation on the outside bottom of the bucket such that ONLY the metal nipple part sticks out. But for some reason chickens love to peck rigid insulation so you need to protect it. And you need a heat source in the bucket.
I use a 5 gallon Igloo drink cooler that I "plumbed" with a very small pump (used for reptile waterfalls), a tube going out to a 3/4" PV pipe (I'm using saddle nipples) then returns to the cooler via a second piece of tubing. Thus the warm water is constantly circulating when the temps are below freezing. The 3/4" pipe is built into the bottom of the nest box (I would make it a separate unit were I to do it again). There is rigid foam all around the pipe and holes in the bottom piece of plywood so that just the nipple pins stick out. I also have a stock tank heater in the cooler. They go on automatically when the water temp hits 40F and I think they heat to about 50F. That works until the outside temp is about 15F. After that I have to replace it with a submersible aquarium heater set at about 75F. That USUALLY works to about -20F but sometimes the nipples still freeze up.
With regard to what you should use first, the waterer you have is fine. And if you don't have a "permanent" water source, you can always take that one in at night (when they won't be drinking anyway) and fill it with warm water in the morning. But you will have to get up
When I got around to making my "permanent" water setup, one of my Anconas was pecking at the nipples before I even had water in it. Chickens are curious sorts. Took no time for them to transition from the 1 gallon chick waterer to the nipples. Presumably the 3 Y/O hens have shown (by example only I'm sure) the 19 week old girls that there is water under the nest box.
