All great ideas, thank you so much. We've ordered a plastic chicken house on legs from green frog designs. More expensive than originally planned but, if their 20 year lifespan is realistic, it's a good investment. It will be easy for my girlfriend to take apart and move/clean on the occasions I'm away with work and is quick and easy to jet wash to get rid of any red mite.
If we put it in the middle of the run, it would only have to be turned 90 degrees each time we move the internal run fencing, which should hopefully be ok with the birds.
We've ordered the door opener with it.
It's not far from the house to the orchard. The hedge on the right of the picture is our kitchen garden, so 30 seconds walk from the back door to the run, though the ability to have the door open on those dark rainy mornings is appealing.
For additional shelter, we'll be planting some new orchard trees come the winter, with protection around them, so they should grow and hopefully live in harmony with the chickens.
Kimbo, I can only suggest reminding your husband that you'll get your way eventually, I'm just a little more realistic about this perhaps
Also, I always loved the chickens that my mum kept so I'm quite happy for there to be more.
Next year they'll be a couple of wieners to fatten up for the autumn and after that, mostly likely a few sheep. Our neighbour raises sheep and uses a couple of our fields for pasture so he's going to help teach us how to look after them so we'll have experience on hand when we have a few of our own.