Requirements will vary on many factors
- Is the coop mobile?
- How much time are you willing to spend cleaning?
- Bantams or Jersey Giants?
- Breeding stock, layers, or meat birds?
- Replacement layers growing out? Culling the roosters eventually?
“So for larger birds figure four square feet per bird with constant fresh ground, eight square feet for layers. If you try to pack more birds in per square foot you are going to have behavioral issues and disease. .”
One of the first decisions…
How Many Square Feet of Space is Needed per Chicken?
That is a lot like asking “How much is a new car?” Size matters, style matters, brand matters, and longevity matters. Are you wanting a Yugo, a Ford Escape, or a BMW? With a coop you need to know how many and what size of birds, how long they are going to be using the space, and for what purpose.
A coop that is too big costs more money and if you want it to be moved to fresh ground on occasion a bigger coop is going to be heavier and riskier to move without damaging the coop. But if you crowd your birds in too tightly you are either going to be finding a need to build additional space or dealing with diseases, aggression, and other overcrowding problems. When you decide to raise chickens the single largest initial cost is going to be the cost of the chicken coop so you need to get the size determined before you get started so you can plan the design and estimate the costs involved.
How you manage that coop is going to be a factor. If you have a small chicken tractor and move it to fresh ground each day you can house more birds as they aren’t walking in their own waste each day..
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of each day. Only during the summer is there not fresh grass, but even then, chickens start the day with fresh ground, free from their own manure and the birds have fresh ground and grass to keep them occupied. The same size coop that isn’t moved turns into a mud hole quickly as the birds dig dusting areas which retain water and the grass is gone and won’t be returning till the coop is moved. You are going to be able to keep a lot more birds in the mobile coop than the stationary coop.
Then there is the size of the birds. A flock of Jersey Giants are going to need more room than a flock of bantams. And if you are raising meat birds that have a lot of the natural instincts bred out of them there can be more birds per square foot than a heritage breed that is active and seeks distractions. How old the birds are is a factor too, chicks don’t need a lot of room, pullets more room but they won’t be in the grow out pen for long, but long term layers or brood stock will need the most room because of the infinite time they will be living in the space. Meat birds will grow quickly and while it is less humane they are only going to be the most crowed for three weeks or so before they are butchered.
Breeding stock requires the most room because you have the most invested in them and healthy breeding stock puts out healthy eggs and chicks. A meat bird that has its back pecked up is going into the freezer, not so for a prize hen. A good rule of thumb for breeding stock is to allow 8 to 20 square feet per bird if they are large breeds and if you are moving the coop to fresh ground every few days.
Coop in the garden
- Stationary coops need more room per bird
- Behavioral issues come with crowding
- Plenty of ventilation helps
- Ammonia from the manure will harm chicken’s lungs
- Inclement weather requires more space per bird
- Bantams will take up about 25% less space
“There is roost space to consider too and for larger birds you are going to need a foot of roost space per bird and enough room between the roost bars that they don’t bump into each other, around 18” center to center will work. ”
A small flock of replacement feathered out chicks could be squeezed into a pen with 2 square feet each until they are 7 weeks old and at that age you can usually pick out the roosters and split them off, giving the hens four square feet each, again assuming you are constantly moving the coop to fresh ground. In another 7 weeks you would need to split the pen again as the larger birds are going to be too crowded.
So for larger birds figure four square feet per bird with constant fresh ground, eight square feet for layers. If you try to pack more birds in per square foot you are going to have behavioral issues and disease. You can go a little more if you keep clean litter, have excellent ventilation, move the pen to fresh ground often, get rid of ill birds immediately, have good protection from rain and wind when it is cold, and have plenty of good quality feed and fresh water available in abundance.
Crowded conditions will stress the birds, they will fight or pick on each other more if for no other reason than they can’t get away from each other in a small pen.
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So far we have been talking about a combination of coop and run space on a constantly moved mobile coop. There is roost space to consider too and for larger birds you are going to need a foot of roost space per bird and enough room between the roost bars that they don’t bump into each other, around 18” center to center will work.
If you over crowd chickens the increased amount of stress and contact with their waste will increase the chance of one bird coming down with a disease that will quickly spread. They will bully and peck each other more, the coop will require more frequent cleaning, ammonia from their manure builds up and harms their lungs, more stress will be present, fewer eggs and more broken eggs, less exercise as the birds can’t really move around without bumping into other birds, and you might lose more birds to suffocation if they pile up at night instead of roosting.
But if you have a stationary coop you need to allow more square footage per bird. For larger breeds figure on at least four square feet inside the enclosed coop for those days when it is snowing or raining and the birds stay inside and at least ten square feet per bird out in the run. For bantam breeds you can cut the footage requirements by about 25% at least. You are going to need to spend more time and effort cleaning the pen and keeping deep litter to avoid having health problems than you had. If you are allowing the birds to free range or have a large penned in run figure about 300 square feet per bird.
A small stationary coop
- Access to gardens are a great way to increase bird density
- Plenty of room equals relaxed chickens
- Allow plenty of roost room including flying up and flying down to the coop floor
- Height of the coop is for the caretaker’s access
- Plan for nest boxes, waterers, and feeders in your footage plan
“There is roost space to consider too and for larger birds you are going to need a foot of roost space per bird and enough room between the roost bars that they don’t bump into each other, around 18” center to center will work. ”
Having a garden for the birds to forage in helps as the birds will gravitate to where the loose soil, bugs, and plants are. If they don’t have loose soil they will start digging dusting areas and over graze your lawn creating bare spots and the chicken manure is going to cause problems if the outdoor space is crowded.
Increasing the amount of garden to grass can help, you might even want to plant a garden just for the chickens, ideally surrounding the main garden to act as a chicken moat that bugs have to pass through before getting to the main garden. The higher quality forage will keep the chickens healthier and happier and your grass lawn will remain healthy.
Another way to increase the number of chickens on a particular plot of land is to split the area up into paddocks and rotate the birds every week to allow the areas to rest for three weeks before the birds come back to forage.
Chickens that have plenty of room to live will behave very differently, more relaxed. It is not pampering a bird to allow as much as fifteen square feet per bird inside the coop, that is less than the size of a bathtub to put it in context. Most backyard chicken flocks aren’t high production, they don’t need to squeeze in the birds due to ROI requirements, the people are after healthy and responsible and sustainable food.
Vertical height is far less important as the birds don’t need more than a foot over their heads for normal activity. The roosts do need to be above the nest boxes to encourage roosting. However cleaning and maintaining a two foot tall run isn’t fun unless it is a mobile coop, even then retrieving a dead or sick bird is going to take some effort. A run high enough for someone to crouch over in is a good investment and a coop high enough to stand and work in is almost a necessity unless you have just a few birds. If you keep the nest boxes at least 18” off the ground the birds will utilize that space or have the next boxes project out of the coop so there is no lost footage and the eggs can be collected from the outside.
A simple chicken tractor
- Manure trays easy cleaning
- Birds will share waterers easier than feeders
- Plan conservatively, better too much room as too little
“Chickens will jockey for position on roosts and they need room to get up and down off the roost, usually by flying, so make sure there is more than enough room for a few birds to fly ”
Don’t forget to plan for the space needed for feeders and waterers. Birds will take turns eating and drinking but if you use limited access feeders like treadle feeders plan on no more than twelve to sixteen birds per feeder unless there are other sources of feed during the day or free range available.
Your roost needs to be over an area that has a manure tray as a lot of the manure generated will come from under the roost. That leaves the coop that much cleaner and more sanitary. Chickens will jockey for position on roosts and they need room to get up and down off the roost, usually by flying, so make sure there is more than enough room for a few birds to fly up to a crowded roost and enough room on the floor to avoid hitting nest boxes, feeders, and waterers.