What do you put in your Run?

[EverythingDucks]

I've been looking for some chicken run ideas but I can't seem to find any ideas for the inside. I was thinking maybe some plants (like Mexican feather grass) and some roosts but I'm new to chickens so I don't know a whole lot yet.
Feel free to share pictures and any ideas you have

 

[Mvan42]

Most use wood chips, sand or mulch etc.. plants will not live long. Chicken scratch around and kill everything in the run. Mine free range most afternoons and there run has nothing growing in it.

 

[David61]

lol, chickens will peck it clean. you can fence off part of run and let it recover but runs are a desert . over grazed by little T-rex.

 

[thewatsonfarm]

We have several planters and a good-size dirt bath in our run. The plants that have survived have been a camelia, a night-blooming jasmine, a lavender, and a few other things. Everything except the lavender was planted as a 5-gallon, so they had a strong root system, plus then I planted every plant inside a cylinder made of chicken wire, to protect the plant & the root ball. That has worked well.

I also have strawberries in hanging baskets, which the girls eat when a shoot is long enough. There are party lights, a tree stump seat for me, and friends have helped me paint some artwork especially for the run, so it's a pretty place where I to want to spend time.

 

[NatJ]

I've been looking for some chicken run ideas but I can't seem to find any ideas for the inside. I was thinking maybe some plants (like Mexican feather grass) and some roosts but I'm new to chickens so I don't know a whole lot yet.

Possible things to have in the run:
--something to scratch in. A compost pile is great, layers of wood chips and other bedding materials are fine, dirt usually becomes either mud or hard like concrete. Other options also exist.
--something to sit on. Perches, stumps, a lawn chair, a picnic table, a tree.... lots of possibilities here.
--something to sit under, like a roof or a table or a bush. Provides shelter from sun, rain, wind, and scary flying things like hawks and airplanes.
--a place to dustbathe. Might just be dry dirt under something to keep rain off.
--green plants to eat. Harder to arrange, because the chickens eat them so fast, but throwing in garden weeds and vegetable trimmings can help.
--bugs. These come all by themselves, if you have compost or bedding on the floor of the run.


If you are starting with a completely bare run, maybe dump in a truckload of wood chips, and sit an old coffee table in the middle for them to perch on and relax under.

Then you can throw in all food scraps and compostable things as you get them, and in a while the floor of the run will have turned into a compost pile with lots of earthworms and other goodies for the chickens to eat.

 

[thewatsonfarm]

Our girls often hide under the bushes. As NatJ mentioned above, something to hide under is important. We have a coopers hawk that stalks our area. He's not too bright. He can't see the hardware mesh roof of our run, but he sees our hens. He has dive-bombed the run trying to get some dinner, only to bounce off. (I'm surprised he hasn't broken his neck!) I imagine the girls would be terrified if they didn't have places to hide.

 

[CluckerFamily]

I have a roof on my run but still have logs to jump on, a place for dirt baths, and perches.
I do have lots of trees, bushes, and perennials in my yard for when they are free ranging. This fall I just added a repurposed gazebo. I have done stick tent structures that sort of resemble a teepee with the sticks being spaced far enough apart that a chicken could get through, I have seen some creative stick structures and tunnels on Pinterest that people have made for kids and thought it would be cool for the chickens.

 

[3KillerBs]

You can see the coop, the feeder/waterer shelter, the anti-hawk shelter, the in-run perch, and the straw-bale wind baffles.

They dig their own dust baths, which I fill up with pine straw if they get too deep for my comfort.

To summarize:

Things to sit on.
Things to sit under.
Places to get away from the others.
Shelter from sun/rain/airborne predators.
Stuff to dig through in search of goodies.
Wind baffles arranged to offer protection from any angle since we can get storms from any direction.

 

[drinkoj]

Their chickens, don't over think it.

Several roosts (a 2" or 3" think tree branch works great) in different locations, a good deep layer of material on the run floor to dig/scratch in, really good supply of water and food, something to sit under or have a tarp/roofing over the run to provide shelter and safety, and a few obstacles like cement blocks for them to be able to use to get away from another chicken if they've got a cricket they're all fighting for.

 

[-Clementine-]

I have free rangers now, but I used to have chickens in a run. I fed them 'chicken scraps' which is basically food off the plate that is safe for chickens to eat, and they loved it.