[james154]

I have a chicken run 8 foot long by 4 foot wide and 4 foot high I currently have 3 light Sussex hens and one bantam cockerel not sure of breed will they be OK in there or will they need a bigger run they seem very happy eating grass and siting in the sun   

[mentalmilly]

l have kept hens in a run which was a bit bigger than that. Nice when the sun is out and in the summer, but the problem is when the weather changes to rain the run can get muddy with the hens scratching around all day. You have to see how things go and adapt accordingly.  If you can give them more room they would probably be happier, soon they may run out of grass to peck at.

[HesterF]

Can you move it? A moveable run of that size should be OK although I'm a big softie with lots of room and prefer to give them loads of space. At the moment my group of a cockerel plus three hens has 10m x 10m to themselves. They don't really need that much though. Has your run got a roof to it? The only other thought I had was that it's not fox proof if not - don't know whether that's an issue for you or not.

H

[james154]

yes I can move it around the lawn the house is on top the run with a ramp and its fox proof I had some hens in a fenced run and a fox got them that's why im keeping them penned in

[chrismahon]

Hi James. In a fixed run I always advise at least 4 square metres per bird, or 40 square feet. That can be reduced slightly with more placid breeds and it helps a lot if there is a large perch in the run which is big enough for all of them. We used to have just over one square metre per bird in runs that were moved regularly but also the birds free ranged in the afternoons. They got really stressed waiting to get out as 1 square metre, or 10 square feet, is far too small. Just letting them out for 10 minutes makes a huge difference in my experience.


You only have 32 square feet for 4 birds. I would quadruple that space at least. In small runs you get stressed birds getting ill and also bullying and feather pecking with boredom. As Mentalmilly said, when the weather changes and they have no grass, just mud, the current picture of happiness will change.

[Clansman]

Don't see any problem with that James if you can keep the ground in reasonable condition.

A lot of the chicken arks available have less available space than that and are designed for more birds than you have.

[HesterF]

Yep, I reckon if they're moving onto fresh ground so there's new interest, it should be fine. I made one of my enclosed runs bigger by putting another one next to it so the end of one joined up to the door of the other in a sort of L shape. My four that are now in a bigger run were in there for a couple of months after they arrived quite happily, just being moved every couple of days onto clear grass. Also a good way of keeping worms down if you lawn is big enough to keep them on the move on a few week cycle.

H