[Chippet]

Hi

I've had my 3 hens, for exactly 3 weeks, they've been free ranging for probably about 2 weeks, but only for 3 days out of 7 when I'm at home, then evenings when I'm back at work til they decide to go to bed, which is getting earlier and earlier at the mo due to the weather.

Now I knew they would start to wreck the lawn when I let them out, but I wasn't expecting it quite this quick. We have a walled garden and they've concentrated their efforts to one corner and worked outwards and it just mud at the moment, with a bit of pulled moss and grass on top. Other than fencing that bit off (which would be a bit tricky) is there anything else I can do? They just seemed to spend all day in this one corner scratching away, I thought they might have spread there efforts around a bit.? :blink:

At this rate I'm not gonna have a lawn left this timenext month!!!

[compostqueen]

Well corale them in and rotate them to fresh pasture every month. Your lawn will be better off for having hens on it (apart from the divots that is, but they can be filled with sieved soil, compost and grass seed  )  Hens rake out all the moss, get air into it and they fertilise it as they go. They keep it mowed for you and you will notice if you care to look at it from the bedroom window that it will be much greener than the unmunched bits.  The hens will also remove the weeds from the lawn for you as well

My husband was very anti-hen for the reason of damage to his stupid beloved lawn but once he saw how bright green and weed free it was becoming he soon changed his tune.

[andy46]

I can agree with compostqueen my grass has never looked so green and healthy since i got my girls 6 weeks ago(first time chick owner) the only bit that has been scratched up is under my maple tree and the grass did not grow to well there. That is where they like to dust bathe aswell.

[nerdle]

Mine's just covered in hen poo.

[loretta cluck]

My entire lawn was trashed in a space of weeks.....I have 3 small lawns, so just threw in the towel, handed a lawn over to the girls and once they'd virtually demolished the lot, had wood chippings delivered and covered the bare earth with that....they love it, and i just make sure they are given greens to substitute the grass they were eating....No way on the planet will they be going near the other lawns!!!

[nerdle]

What breed are they Chippet - my hen (Silverlink) hardly scratches - might be a breed thing.

[symonep]

a year or so ago when we had the really heavy snow, as it was melting the hens loved it as it was quite boggy, they ate without a word of a lie, every single blade of grass. We had to relay the lawn!!

we kept them in their run for quite a while after that and every week brought them a turf that was put in their coop to eat and scratch. this year we decided to start letting them freerange again and the law is surviving, i would fence off any area you want to revocer and see if that works

[tosca100]

We only have a small lawn, already wrecked by our two bitches, and to be honest the only difference we have noticed is that it doesn't need mowing very often, even with th wet summer we have had. They tend to use the borders for serious scratching, and think they are in heaven if you dig a little bit over for them.

Scoop the poo several times a day though, because it is tasty to dogs and horrible on shoes!

[Trillium]

Not only that, Tosca, but dogs love to roll in it! 

[symonep]

We only have a small lawn, already wrecked by our two bitches

Scoop the poo several times a day though, because it is tasty to dogs and horrible on shoes!

Try the dog rocks you can buy, they work amazingly well and stop their pee from burning the lawn.
Our dogs love to eat poo and then breath in your face.....such wonderful animals 

[Chippet]

We've got 3 hybrids, a black rock, speckeldy and bluebell. All seem to scratch around the same.

We do have a couple of raised beds that are currently filled with shillies. If I was to left these and expose the soil underneath, do you think that will distract them enough from the grass? Or is that wishful thinking?

I don't want a neat, beautiful lawn, but I do want to keep some grass!!