Agri Vehicles Insurance from Greenlands

Author Topic: How much space do you give your hens?  (Read 5237 times)

Azzdodd

  • Joined Apr 2012
How much space do you give your hens?
« on: September 17, 2014, 08:45:14 pm »
Due to mr.fox visiting in the day my hens have had to be confined to a electric poultry netting area it bought 100m made a rectangle on some poor grazing (lots of weeds & long grass) they have a old trailer & a calf hut to sleep in & lay there is about 25 hens & 2 cockerels in there is this enough space? Mine have always had free roam off the 4 acres they are on till now

HesterF

  • Joined Jul 2012
  • Kent
  • HesterF
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #1 on: September 18, 2014, 12:07:56 am »
My most crowded run currently has about 10m2 each. They still have plenty of grass so it's not over-foraged. If I understand your dimensions correctly, you'll have over 20m2 each (20mx30m = 600m2/27 chickens) so personally I'd say yes. The legal free range definition is ridiculously small - something like an average of 2m2 each.

lord flynn

  • Joined Mar 2012
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #2 on: September 18, 2014, 10:21:23 am »
can you move the fence regularly?if they have fresh ground it keeps them occupied.

Stereo

  • Joined Aug 2012
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #3 on: September 18, 2014, 02:25:45 pm »
I believe the Soil Association standard is 10m2 per bird. We've got a 100m net which should be good for 65 birds (25 x 25). We've got about 40 in ours and they can't keep up with the grass. The only issue is having a fixed shed, it gets really muddy around it in winter. So I'm trying to work out how to build a larger scale movable house on steep land.

Azzdodd

  • Joined Apr 2012
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #4 on: September 19, 2014, 11:30:24 am »
Mine measure's 40m on the longer sides 10m on the smaller sides they have a trailer so I can move that easy...I am going to move the pen to get the grass down to a good length for them they have pond & plenty of features in there

chrismahon

  • Joined Dec 2011
  • Gascony, France
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #5 on: September 19, 2014, 02:29:05 pm »
Soil association was 15m2 per bird, but my info is 2 years out of date now. All depends how good the soil is. We had 20m2 in the Dordogne and it was stripped bare in 2 weeks. Here 15m2 is fine unless under trees. Depends also on the breeds. Some are far more rigorous scavengers than others.

Stereo

  • Joined Aug 2012
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #6 on: September 19, 2014, 03:25:33 pm »
Soil association was 15m2 per bird, but my info is 2 years out of date now. All depends how good the soil is. We had 20m2 in the Dordogne and it was stripped bare in 2 weeks. Here 15m2 is fine unless under trees. Depends also on the breeds. Some are far more rigorous scavengers than others.

I think they may have changed that since:

http://www.soilassociation.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=9zNik0Pt378%3d&tabid=135

Page 5 says 100 birds per hectare which I think comes to 10 m2?

It's academic as you say. We are not organic but like to look at the welfare standards as a target to go for. The fact is that my 40 birds don't 'use' half of their 25 x 25 run so it may be better to have a smaller run and move them more often.

My plan next year is to have 33 bird flocks (30 hens and 3 cockerels) in 75m nets which means adding a 25m with hot gate to all my 50m nets. Then I should have a house that is small enough to move easily.

F.CUTHBERT

  • Joined Aug 2011
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #7 on: September 21, 2014, 06:56:04 pm »
I didn't check your link but a hectare is 10,000 square metres so that would be 100m2 per bird which seems a lot to me.

Stereo

  • Joined Aug 2012
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #8 on: September 22, 2014, 09:24:20 am »
Sorry, typo. It says 1000 birds per hectare. I looked up free range and that seems to be saying 1m2 per bird which would mean I could get 625 birds in my run. That amount would be crammed in and would decimate it in a day. In no way is that 'free range'.

chrismahon

  • Joined Dec 2011
  • Gascony, France
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #9 on: September 23, 2014, 10:42:29 am »
10m2 is insufficient here. Lack of rainfall in the summer months would turn it into a 'dustbowl'. What is quite clear to me is that the general (not organic) 'Free Range' figure here and in England of 4m2, means that the birds get exercise but no grass or insects. In fact to get a healthy amount of insects needs more like 1000m2 here. One local egg producer boasts that his get 9m2 free range, but that doesn't really achieve anything tangible.


So back to the original question. How much space do they need? There are welfare, sustainability and food issues here. If you were previously relying on an insect intake to supplement their feed with protein Azzdodd, you will now have to adjust accordingly. Laying hens need 15% and wheat gives them 8-10%. You may find they stop laying until you get the balance right. You may also find the yolks lose colour without a grass intake and you will need to find a substitute, unless your feed has chemical colourants in it already (yolk enhancers), as most pellets do.

Stereo

  • Joined Aug 2012
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #10 on: September 23, 2014, 12:44:29 pm »
I've pretty much settled on the idea of a simple 6 x 6 foot plywood house with deep litter and a pop hole in each wall. I will put 4 wooden posts out in the field to make an 18 x 18 (roughly) metre square with the house in the middle. This should allow me to create a triangle off each side of the house with a 50m net and tighten it to the posts. The net will be moved every month to the next face of the house. This should mean that each of the 4 sectors gets 3 months of rest from poultry and will be grazed with sheep to keep the grass down during the summer. Probably some store lambs to act as mowers and then into the freezer when the grass stops. I figure not only will this help with worm burden but allow the grass time to recover in each sector. Also moving the net regularly means it's easier to avoid shorting it with long grass. The house should be plenty big enough for 30 birds and the total pen size would be 324m2.

I also plan to have a separate and movable nest box 'house' with no roosts. I figure this will stop birds sleeping in the nest boxes as they will want to be with the flock and also cut down on broodiness as I can pop any broodies back in the roost house at night and that might break them as there will be nowhere to sit. Also the ground around our houses gets muddy in the winter and they bring this in on their feet and mess up the eggs. With a separate nest unit, I can keep moving it to a clean grassy area.

chrismahon

  • Joined Dec 2011
  • Gascony, France
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #11 on: September 23, 2014, 01:25:54 pm »
Sounds like a good layout Stereo. Rotating the grazing is always a good idea, but I'm not sure how much grass will be left for the sheep. Guess it will be important the grazing is rotated on time, every time.


The old poultry books suggest that sort of layout. So if it worked for them? There is no mention of sheep in my books though. We used to graze the whole orchard with sheep, simply to save on mowing because chickens need short grass. But there each one had about 100m2, so no danger of them scratching it all up.

lord flynn

  • Joined Mar 2012
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #12 on: September 23, 2014, 02:19:54 pm »
I'd be interested to know if the nest box idea works because that could be very useful!

Stereo

  • Joined Aug 2012
Re: How much space do you give your hens?
« Reply #13 on: September 24, 2014, 12:03:00 am »
I've seen a few folk in the US do the windmill idea with a fixed house. Kingbird farm is one. A lot of the reading I have done about the 'old ways' before wormers suggest that getting a mix of species on the land with rest from each is the best plan. I like the deep litter idea as it would save on labour and also add heat to the house in winter. If I can make it work....

 I've been working on the nest box concept today, trying to do it on the cheap as usual. Basic idea is a light pallet on legs with sides and a hinged roof and then some king of plastic storage boxes / buckets inside for nest boxes. The deluxe version will feature rollaways but I need to test the concept on the cheap first and have some pullets just coming up to lay. May be hard to persuade older hens to use my new fangled gadgets.

 

Forum sponsors

FibreHut Energy Helpline Thomson & Morgan Time for Paws Scottish Smallholder & Grower Festival Ark Farm Livestock Movement Service

© The Accidental Smallholder Ltd 2003-2024. All rights reserved.

Design by Furness Internet

Site developed by Champion IS