Orpingtons! Do they did up your garden?

[Mik]

Hi, Can anyone advise I am on the verge of buying a coop with run, As I would love to have 2 or 3 happy girls running around my garden. I love the Orpington breed and have been told they do not dig up your garden! is that true? As i would like them to be free all day to roam and be happy! but not dig up my beautiful borders or vegetable's. Please advise me.
Thank you Mik

 

[Tuffoldhen]

Well, my orps do not free range for that very reason...I have to watch them when I let them out in the evenings...they head straight for my flower or veggie garden...can tear thru a bed of leaf lettuce in no time!!...I would advise a coop and run, and make time for yourself to watch them in the evenings or daytime if you let them out...

 

[Yogiman]

I've got 19 orps that free range all year. You would not believe what they can and will do to a garden and or flower beds. They are like little bull dozers and walking garbage disposers. They eat every green thing in sight and can dig holes that you would not believe. But none of that matters to me because I let them do as they please. I can always fix their damage.

 

[Mik]

Really...... that was not the answer I was hoping for. My vegtables are in large oak barrels so should be pretty mucH out of the way of harm, but my boarders are vunerable!
Do they dig all your flowers up? and what do they do to your lawn?

 

[Mik]

OH ECK! I have been told the oposite and that they are really doscile and too lazy to dig?
So on the other side of this coversation.... Is there any plants that will cause harm to my girls to be? as its a traditional cottage garden with fox gloves, delfiniums, heliborah, poppy's, holihox, etc, etc

 

[Katy]

Don't count on your barrels being safe....they'll hop up there in no time flat!!

 

[Yogiman]

Mine don't have access to my lawn since they are on pasture. If they can find a spot that doesn't have grass growing on it, you can bet they are going to make a dust bowl of it. They range on the pasture in a group and eat grass like a herd of cattle ranging. They leave the feeders with the feed and head out to pasture to graze. When I open the garden to them at the end of the growing season they see it as a buffet line. It's amazing the depth of hole that they can dig when they dust bathe.

 

[Mik]

This sounds as if it is going to be fun! Is there any plants that they don't like the taste of and will not touch?

 

[Yogiman]

If there is a plant that they don't like, I have not found it yet. But I am referring to garden veggies primarily. They can and will completely devour a garden in short order. You would not believe what they can do to a huge head of cabbage. They will hollow it out leaving only the very outter leaves and then go back and eat the outter leaves as desert. lol

 

[Mik]

I do have another question if that is ok? will they climb a ramp to get in their coop of a night time? Just with them being the larger figured ladies?