Don’t underestimate the utility of your chickens! Your feathery friends are not just good at making eggs, but also they are wonderful garden keepers. It seems like a strange thing to say about chickens, but the fact is that they eat weeds and other pesky bugs that rome around in your garden. And with a DIY chicken tunnel, you can have them working for you whilst they feel more free. The tunnel allows you to design a specific area for the chickens to walk through the garden, without getting into those pretty parts, where all the flowers and sculptures might be. Without any further ado, here is what materials you need to have in order to start the DIY project: 4′ wire fencing, 1″ thick Wood slats, bungee cords, wood screws, wire cutter, saw, and drill.
Great Idea
What a terrific idea.
If you wish the same effect and in fact want more food for your chickens close the bottom with 1 to one and one half inch square opening hardware cloth.
You will still have the bugs removed, the grass trimmed neatly with faster regrowth and of course that means more greens for the chickens.
. Broad leaved weeds will not survive long as their crowns are destroyed.
I’ve been “sustainable,” since the sixties and at eighty that’s a lot of years and a continuing reliance on it.
set your chickens free mate, fence the garden and let your birds roam . Looks like a chook prison to me, all you need is towers and guard chickens with guns bahahahaha
Predators, such as hawks, owls and eagles are a problem in my area. That’s why the chooks can’t be truly free range.
Thats fine Soulie, but not always possible or good for the chickens, For example living near a road, or having your own or neighbours dogs that roam in the yard on occasion
I agree, this requires further modification.
Dogs — even family dogs, will get into a chicken or turkey coop, too. Poor birdies.
Soulie, this would not be feasible in our area, even though we live in a small city. We have hawks and fox who love eating chickens. We had friends who learned the hard way. They would let them roam free when they were outside with them and a hawk just swooped down and grabbed one right in front of my friend, The foxes were also cunning and found ways to get into the coop at night. The above chicken run looks wonderful, keeps them safe and lets them have room to run around the garden if not through it.
What a great idea
Great idea, but are these your photos? If not, where are the photo credits? I’ve seen these pics all over Facebook.
its clearly not the subject!
I think it is a nifty idea for the chickens; allows them to exercise and keeps them safe. If you have seen this all over Facebook: (I have not) this my first time seeing it, then that might possibly mean there has been a whole lot of sharing of a great idea going on.
The photos with the garden are pictures of my backyard 🙂
Excellent idea to have lovely free range healthy chickens who also keep the garden healthy!!
I love the idea, keeping them safe yet still free to roam in certain areas!
Like this idea. Following ty
Shut up ya old fart
Shit up your mothers nose
So where are the directions?
Text me I have a paten on a system I make that the predators can’t get to them. Haven’t had a chance to test against all predators but dog,birds, Bob cats are a few so far.
Hi Mary, do you have plans you could send me?
Stephanie
I’d be interested too.
So what you’ve seen them all over the Internet. Show me, show me they’re yours. She must be from Missouri.
Agreed, Emery. Who gives a rats rear end where they came from as long as they are used “educationally,” as they are here. People read this, see the pics, and their lives are made better. That’s all that matters. And I’d bet there’s more than a 50/50 chance that the original photographer would likely agree and would appreciate that people are learning from his/her contribution.
Roam. Not rome.
If you look closely at the pix you’ll see the tunnel sections are
A) held together by plastic cable ties (and in the 2nd, 3rd & 4th pix the hoops are each presumably formed into a circle the same way). No visible bungee cords, the hoops are cut at curve & corner joins and again, tied with cable ties.
B) in the first pic they’re bottomless, with hoops of wire stapled/nailed/screwed to the wood frames. Sections of these may be held together with bungees but curves and corners will still require cutting the wire to form them. A waste of wood IMHO.
Point being you don’t need plans, just 4′ horse wire, cable ties, tin snips and a measuring tape.
PS I like the idea of a hardware cloth bottom but that would add a bunch more cable ties and hours of labor OR you’d have to use the wood frames and staples etc to affix the cloth to them.
PPS: Unless they’re on lush grass the chickens may not want to walk on hardware cloth. I dunno if it could cause bumblefoot, either.
No me parece bien ese tunel para gallinas , es un martirio. Y si se revirtieran los papeles?
I love the tunnel. How can I get the plans?
We have woods in our backyard and lots of animals come into our yard. (That’s how we lost our last chickens) is there anyway to make this really safe for chickens
I love this!
I think I would use pig rings to hold the chicken wire together and I love the idea of hardware cloth on the floor. I used it in my huge mobile coop so the poop would drop out on the ground at night. Sadly fracking has destroyed my organic farming business so now I am looking for downsizing ideas. This is a real keeper. I would like to design a frame to fit over a bed that was fallow so the chickens could scratch and fertilize the bed not just circle the perimeter.
Oh this is called a chicken moat and MEN has an article on it.
And your allow to kill any animal dogs, fox, hawk, others that is killing your food source on your land in the country. We have chickens and we will protect them best we can.
We have eagles. Without the protection of the tunnel the chickens wouldn’t last a day b
Would like the chicken coop design.
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