Official BYC Poll: Is your RUN Covered or Not?

[sunnie7]

Of course if money was no issue and you had an easy way to make it happen (no trees in the way) I’m sure most people would have a cover run.

However, what is your current run like? Covered/ uncovered, size and what is the floor/ bedding made up of?

*please feel free to add a photo of your setup!


(Check out more Official BYC Polls HERE!)

 

[rosemarythyme]

Do you mean covered as in a roof or does netting count? I'll assume "any covering" counts so I'd say covered. I have netting but sure wish I had a roof, I'd definitely consider that in the future!

Mine is netted over, 20x25 split in half, with deep litter.

 

[sunnie7]

Do you mean covered as in a roof or does netting count? I'll assume "any covering" counts so I'd say covered. I have netting but sure wish I had a roof, I'd definitely consider that in the future!

Mine is netted over, 20x25 split in half, with deep litter.

Does your stay pretty wet?

 

[BDutch]

No roof, but strong netting. One part (9m2) for hawks and another part (6m2) with cat netting they sell to lock cats up on a balcony.

The floor used to be grass, but it became a dirt floor, mainly clay. There is 1.5m2 with grass, barley and herbs. Its covered with hwc. And there are several bushes in the run. Laurel and 4 different berrie bushes.

And there is an old bench in the run where they sit on to enjoy the sun in the morning and a window (60• angle) under wich they can take a sand bath

 

[rosemarythyme]

Does your stay pretty wet?

We get a lot of rain but my lot also has excellent drainage. We actually had floods twice this past winter, one was several inches deep through the entire section of lawn - but the run drained out faster than any other area in the yard, thanks to the built up deep litter there.

Flood #1, flood 2 was way worse.



Only 2 days later:

 

[sunnie7]

We get a lot of rain but my lot also has excellent drainage. We actually had floods twice this past winter, one was several inches deep through the entire section of lawn - but the run drained out faster than any other area in the yard, thanks to the built up deep litter there.

Flood #1, flood 2 was way worse.

View attachment 2107794

Only 2 days later:
View attachment 2107795

ahhhh yours gives me some hope for mine!!!! We just put ours up and still have a lot to do to it but ours gets a lot of water too when it rains a lot but also drains pretty quickly. I’m hoping once I start putting stuff down for the deep litter it will get better. What all do you put in your deep litter and what did you start with? We just moved our ducks down here and are going to put rock around their pool and my 6 week old chicken just moved into the coop 2 days ago. They haven’t ventured out to the run yet!

 

[aart]

Covered with 2x4 mesh....because, Hawks.


My runs have semi-deep litter(cold composting), never clean anything out, just add smaller dry materials on occasion, add larger wood chippings as needed.
Aged ramial wood chippings are best IMO.

 

[sunnie7]

Covered with 2x4 mesh....because, Hawks.


My runs have semi-deep litter(cold composting), never clean anything out, just add smaller dry materials on occasion, add larger wood chippings as needed.
Aged ramial wood chippings are best IMO.

I’m now regretting having the kids clean up the big pile of bark from cutting wood all winter we have tons of woods and trees and limbs everywhere so I’m sure it’s not going to be too hard collecting stuff to add. Just need to get a good amount to get started. We have some trees in the woods that have been down many years that I’m sure I can get quite a bit from.

 

[rosemarythyme]

What all do you put in your deep litter and what did you start with?

My base is aged chunky wood chips, similar to the chips aart showed in her post. On top of that I add dried leaves (I save all my fall leaves for use in run and for compost, last year got about 20 bags of leaves), dried short grass clippings (I mow with an electric mower, leave the clippings to dry on lawn, then rake up), some pine needles, garden trimmings from vegetables and from weeding. The chickens enjoy scratching it all around and mixing it up, so no need for me to do anything more than dumping piles of plant matter into the run.

I used to have an awful mud problem in the run, like it was so smelly, thick and sticky that my boots were getting yanked off my feet by the mud, so deep litter really helped stabilize the ground in the run area.

 

[easterbun]

The one that I'm currently building (about halfway through that process now) will be covered for shade... we've had uncovered runs in the past and a run covered in netting and neither were much of a deterrent to predators (the netting doesn't take much to deteriorate to the point of not being functional). We lost so many birds to hawks and other predators over the years... I would NEVER use netting again, it was basically a huge headache and wasn't really that useful, and I'd shy away from having a run that wasn't covered as well. The design of our prior coop/run didn't make it possible to cover it without basically rebuilding the entire thing, which I was never ready to commit to doing (the coop had many other issues too, which is why I'm building a new one).

The chicken tractor that I built to "solve" that problem was covered in 1x1 cage wire and eventually we threw a tarp over it for shade... it still wasn't/isn't completely predator proof though.