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Chicken keepers

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Newbie looking for advice on coops. Please help

5 replies

lexcat · 03/03/2012 15:44

Love http://www.forshamcottagearks.com/chicken-houses-and-chicken-runs/boughton-6-bird-chicken-house.html this one but a little out of budget. Was http://www.pandtpoultry.co.uk/product/categoryid/10/productid/1324?= thinking not sure on quality or how easy it would be to move. Lastly http://www.cornwallpoultryhouses.co.uk/online-shop/poultry-houses/details/7/1/poultry-houses/st-loy st loy with the run is lovely too.

Any help would be gratefully received as dd so excited and said I'd try and get sorted asap. After all I have been talking chickens for a few years now but never got them.

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lexcat · 03/03/2012 15:50

Sorry my tablet keeps putting spaces were I don't want them.

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atillathehen · 03/03/2012 18:28

Not trying to put you off - has a happy ending Grin

I was in the same position as you - always wanted chickens and decide to rehome some ex-batts due to the recent changes. Found a pretty chicken coop and run which stated it would hold 6-9 hens decided to get 6 hens. Sorted!

Since then it has been a pretty steep learning curve!

Don't know what type of hens you are getting but ex batts are pretty big and one you have a drinking water and food containers in these runs there really isn't a lot of room. Also that isn't taking into account that they establish a pecking order which wasn't a pretty process and they can't get away from each other in there.

We quickly realised that the run was totally inadequate and ended up letting them roam free in the garden during the day until we built a larger one. Result - no garden left! Also it cost as much for the stuff for the new run as the original coop. We now have a larger run and they are much happier and the garden is looking better too as they have pretty efficiently (and very thoroughly) turned over every bit of bare soil! We have ended up redesigning the whole garden around them though.

To summarise: check on size requirements for the number of hens you want - most sites say 2 square feet of run per hen as a minimum. Allowing space for the water and food containers as these take up a fair bit of space and also you need space all around them - especially the food one. Also consider bedding in the coop and buy big for economy.(but you will need somewhere to store these)

They have been trouble since we got them but only because we were mislead by how many chickens the coop and run could hold and didn't do enough research beforehand. We got sorted pretty quickly though.

If you join luckyhens facebook page you can see some of the setups other people have and if you want to pm me I can answer any other questions.

I am in no way sorry that we got them, they are brilliant and wouldn't be without them now. Chicken keeping is great as long as you get their housing right.

Happy chicken keeping!

Told you it had a happy endingGrin

lexcat · 03/03/2012 18:37

Thanks was only planing 3 chocks to start with and if I want more I plan to get some electric chicken fencing.

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