chicken coops/runs/tractors/paddocks/pens/etc.

[Paul Wheaton]

So far, I think there are five general approaches to raising chickens.

1) coop and run

2) chicken tractor

3) truly free range

4) pastured poultry: pens

5) pastured poultry: paddocks (my favorite)

This, naturally, excludes what the big factories do.

Have I left anything out?

[ErinP]

I like truly free range, myself. There's something soothing to the soul to look out your window and see chickens roaming the yard.
Of course, with border collies and a corgi, they need to be monitored. Dogs are dogs, afterall...

[HomegrownAcres]

We let them free range during the day and we lock them in the coop and run at night. Protects them from nighttime predators. We do have a few that spend the night with the pigs in their paddock and do okay. I guess the pigs keep the predators at bay.

Brian
Homegrown Acres
Homegrown Acres.com

[Curtis B]

Mine run the pasture and pens then return to the coop at night. Something that just popped into my head though is how far will they range to get food. I try to limit their food to get them to fend for themselves more, but they don't go too far and still come a runin like they haven't been fed for weeks.

[belladulcinea]

Mine have their own tractors and free range every evening. I am a guerilla chicken raiser so I only have 2 and have to be kinda quiet about it.

[mtman]

Originally Posted by ErinP

I like truly free range, myself. There's something soothing to the soul to look out your window and see chickens roaming the yard.
Of course, with border collies and a corgi, they need to be monitored. Dogs are dogs, afterall...

ours have the run of the place they get locked up at night our dog dosent bother the hens at all

[ovsfarm]

We raise our meat chickens in a chicken tractor. This year we also used it as a half way house to get our new chicks out of the laundry room and to provide some time for a look-see between them and the old girls before putting them all out together. But other than those situations, we pretty much have a full free range situation. Although I try to make it clear that they do NOT have front porch privileges, but am often ignored.

However, we have had a lot more loss this year than in the years when we had the llamas in the adjacent pasture. I guess that just the smell of something as strange as a llama kept many predators at bay. Our major predators have been feral dogs, racoons, possums, and red tailed hawks. The dogs hit day or night. The coons and possums are night stalkers. The hawks come wheeling any time during the day.

If we were going trying to make real money with our miniscule egg business or if we were counting on those hens to keep us fed, then I would change to the free during the day and in a fortified coop at night.

[Wisconsin Ann]

While not a normal thing, I think, I do know a couple of people who raise a few chickens indoors. Generally in the basement or garage. Pens build...the equivalent of an indoor chicken coop. The chickens are given artificial light, room to move around, and chopped grasses, weeds, leftovers, hay as well as pellets or crumbles. (depending on if they're for laying eggs or meat birds.)

[mammabooh]

We'll be building our set-up soon and here is what I have planned...

There will be a run attached to the coop, so the girls will always be able to be outside. The run and the coop will be inside of the pasture, so that I can let them free range in the pasture when I am home (which is almost all of the time). That's the plan, anyway...we might decide against the run and let them have run of the pasture all the time, but I sort of like the double protection that the run will offer. If we put a partial roof over the run, they will be more likely to go outside during long snowy winters.

[starjj]

I am building my coop now. So far I have raised them in the barn and have since moved them to a calf hutch. When the coop is finished they will free range during the day and be cooped at night. I was considering runs but I love to watch them come running when I bring out the pan of chicken feed. They look like fussy old ladies.

The bantams I free range during the day and they live in the barn at night.

One thing about raising the chickens in the barn when you don't want them there any longer it is really really hard to break them of going back there.

The large ones still hang around the barn during the day when they aren't out looking for bugs.

[Ravenlost]

Ours have a very large pen in the pasture behind the garden. They are basically free range, only they're protected from the dogs.

[7thswan]

I usta let them free range, now I have too many flowerbeds that they ruin.The veggie garden is fenced so that wasen't a problem. They love to tear up the mulch looking for bugs. Now they have a coop with a run.

Originally Posted by Paul Wheaton

So far, I think there are five general approaches to raising chickens.

1) coop and run

2) chicken tractor

3) truly free range

4) pastured poultry: pens

5) pastured poultry: paddocks (my favorite)

This, naturally, excludes what the big factories do.

Have I left anything out?

A variable blending of all of the above.

I have a fixed yard and hen house, but often let them out when I'm home to keep an eye on them. I have chicken tractors that are moved daily, but often let them out to free-range as well.

.....Alan.

[Alice In TX/MO]

What's the difference between a pen and a paddock? size?

[HomegrownAcres]

Yep.

Brian

[Paul Wheaton]

Originally Posted by Alice In TX/MO

What's the difference between a pen and a paddock? size?

A pen is gonna be about 10 feet by 20 feet and is generally moved once or twice a day. A pen will have only pasture under it - no bushes or trees.

A paddock could be that small, but is usually bigger. Even in the city. On the farm, a paddock could be a quarter acre. A paddock will usually have trees and bushes in it.

[mpillow]

my layers are 100% free range....the bantams bring babies home now and then

meat birds I do in a woodshed stall

[CountryWannabe]

My hens are totally free ranged currently. I like that they have this amount of "freedom" but it makes egg collecting a problem. As soon as I find one nest site and collect for a few days, they make a different one somewhere else... Plus - they ruin my gardening attempts and roost on my back porch <YUCK>

I am re-arranging a lot of stuff around here, as it looks as if we will be staying for at least another two or more years. So the batch of meat chickies in the brooding coop right now will go into a 35 x 20 run till "D-Day", the layers will go into a 50 x 20 run at least till there are a reasonable number of eggs each day then turned out to free range daily, fed at night <definining "reasonable" may be difficult LOL> The turkeys and ducks are already confined to large runs. I really don't consider the confinement as ideal, but unless I can figure out a way to keep them out the garden and off the porch it is the best I can do short term. I do intend fencing the new garden area, so maybe that will help.

Mary

[PKBoo]

Ours are in a coop & run in a pasture, and we let them out every morning. They have found ways to get out of the pasture though, and love our yard. Yesterday I looked out the window, and there was a chicken head peeking above the grill! A few were up on the deck railing, flew down onto our deck, then couldn't figure out how to get off the deck! Gave my DD & I quite a laugh (till I discovered the "presents" they left behind...)

[Ravenlost]

Originally Posted by Paul Wheaton

A pen is gonna be about 10 feet by 20 feet and is generally moved once or twice a day. A pen will have only pasture under it - no bushes or trees.

A paddock could be that small, but is usually bigger. Even in the city. On the farm, a paddock could be a quarter acre. A paddock will usually have trees and bushes in it.

Then my chickens have a paddock, not a pen. With a big sweet gum, cedar tree and their house in the middle of it. Plus a lot of honeysuckle and wild roses.