Free Range Chicken Square Feet

Unless you have a chicken coop in your backyard or the access to and budget for farm fresh eggs every day you re probably spending some.

Free range chicken square feet.

The first applies to the world of commercial chicken raising. If you plan to create permanent runs and fencing use 250 square feet per bird or more. Cage free pasture raised free range and organic eggs. I minimum square feet for happy chickens.

Certified humane free range. Before you build or buy a chicken coop you need to make sure it s going to be the right size. If we give them 6 8 square feet per chicken that would be 60 80 square feet total. How much space do 6 layers need.

This label requires at least 2 square feet about 0 2 square meters of outdoor space per bird with vegetation for grazing. Birds must be able to go outdoors for at least 6 hours a day. Each hen must have access to 2 square feet of outdoor space which does not need to have growing vegetation. We d class free range as chickens that each have at least 25 square foot of outside space.

I know the words free range evoke images of chickens scratching through the grass of an open field but this is just not the case in the commercial. Ideally this would be without a run keeping them in however this isn t practical all the time due to foxes and other predators trying to catch them. 60 sq ft coop size. A rule of thumb for free range space is 250 to 300 square feet per bird.

An acre has 43 560 square feet so your lovely grass yard needs to be at least 545 square feet per chicken or a square 23 feet on a side. Instead they use a much smaller yard. Few people can devote such acreage to a fenced chicken yard. They say the chickens must be allowed access to some outdoor space.

So an 8 8 or an 8 10 foot coop would be adequate assuming that you provide fresh ground regularly. And that s just for one chicken. Chickens must be outdoors for at least 6.