Will a couple of chooks completely wreck my garden ?

[frumpet]

Am toying with the idea of getting a couple of chickens and letting them roam free in my very enclosed garden , am i mad ? Not particularly garden proud due to digging dog and child !

Dog is chicken friendly .

How big is your garden? We have five chickens in a fenced-off section of the garden. You can see the difference between that and the rest of the garden easily: it is just uneven bumpy poo-covered mud, compared to lawn.

However, when we only had two chickens we let them out in the whole (biggish) garden, and they didn't wreck it or de-lawn it. They did poo a lot though. It also made alfresco eating a challenge, as they used to try and jump up onto the table!

If you're not particularly garden proud, I'd probably let them go free. They may scrat everything up though.

I let mine out the other day and within 30 secs they'd dug up all my begonias and thrown them on to the lawn. I'm not over-fussy about the garden (I prefer a sort of haphazard 'cottage garden' look) but it would be a wasteland within a week if I let them free-range and there are only three of them!

We've just given up on free ranging. The poo was everywhere. That's with four chickens in a large garden.

I have 4 bantams - they are still young. They free range all day long and so far haven't caused any damage to the garden. As for the poo, my disgusting doggies eat it!! The only problem is that the chooks are rather fond of the patio table and chairs and I have to keep clearing the poo off!

I let my ex batt girls free range and they are non wreckers. I think because of their previous life their instinct to scratch up ground is diminished. They have made a dust bath in an empty area of soil, they dig through the compost heap and dig around in the wood chip but they don't touch my plants or veggies, keep off the raised beds and off the patio furniture. So rescuing some ex batts may be an option for you? Granted they don't always lay eggs but so far mine all have (pot luck!)