Thank you for the advice.
We’re starting out small. I’ve NEVER dealt with chickens before so I’m sure I’ll have a lot of questions in the beginning.
Goats, dogs, cats, snakes, rabbits... those I can do. I’m sure it will be an interesting first year with the birds.
My DH is all over the coop and the chicken run plans. He’s going to start with a foot deep trench filled with concrete with barbed wire running beside it. Two layers of wire fencing. A roof on the run (for protection and shade). Misters on the roof of the run to keep them cool in the summer. I have a feeling that our chickens won’t have much to worry about! lol!
Do you have any idea about how many square feet per chicken is required for the run?
I don’t know if there is a rule of thumb for the size of the run, but my chickens stay outside at least 90% of the daylight hours, so I’d say to make it as big as you can.
We have a chicken yard for 22 chickens that is about 20x20 feet, which is plenty big. My husband is a fence builder, so he built a yard out of 8’ tall chain link fence sunk 1 foot in the ground in concrete with a chicken wire top. They have shade from nearby trees. If it rains, they go inside.
Something I wish I had given more thought to is mud. Chicken yard mud is disgusting! This weekend I’m going to rake all of last year’s elm leaves and put them into a pile to use as litter in the yard because it’s getting too slimy gross with the recent rains. I use hay in the chicken house, but it would be too expensive to use in the yard!
I had a situation, as it turned out, a mountain lion was bagging my chickens, years ago.
This sounds gross, but I collected mattress frames, pulled out all the sheeting/stuffing and built massive cages with them.
It worked. You can plant grapes or other vines to shade and beatify.
Chickens smickens you can rent that out for a good price!!!
>>>>My DH is all over the coop and the chicken run plans. He’s going to start with a foot deep trench filled with concrete with barbed wire running beside it. Two layers of wire fencing. A roof on the run (for protection and shade). Misters on the roof of the run to keep them cool in the summer. I have a feeling that our chickens won’t have much to worry about! lol!<<<<<<
Consider making it portable - they work great if you have a garden too. The chickens will eat every bug, tick or whatever in sight. The will clean up remains of plants and eat the over ripe veggies, and scratch up the soil almost ready to plant again.
There are a few shown here:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2181392/posts?page=1285#1285