Pretty new to chickens and very new to BYC. Last May we picked up (sorry for spelling) 3 ameracaunas, 3 silver laced wynadottes, and 2 buff orpingtons. chics were a couple days old and a few are starting to lay right now. I built them a nice 6x8 coop with leftover construction materials as I am a contractor. Since I didn't want to free range for all the red-tailed hawks, coons, etc. I liked the idea of a rotational system on fresh grass/bugs. I built a 3 foot wide run that comes perpendicular off the pop door, we have 4 paddocks 215 sq. ft. that feed off the run. Just shutting a gate at each "closed" paddock. Big question for me: Is 215 square feet large enough for this type of rotational program with 8 large birds, where you keep them in each paddock for 7 days? The paddocks are 8x27 Appreciate any advice before I go around the welded wire with hardware cloth and make it permanent.
Sounds good to me. I have seen chickens in much smaller conditions. However, I always like more...more...MORE... room. But I think it sounds reasonable for the amount of chickens you have.
