Do Chicken Coops Need to Be Placed on Grass?

Before you can bring home chickens for the first time, you need a chicken coop for them to live in. Chicken coops protect your chickens from predators as well as provide them with a safe, dry place to lay their eggs. Your chickens can benefit from living inside a well-placed coop.

  1. Chicken Coop Placement

    • The ideal location for your chicken coop is a large, grassy area with plenty of airflow and some shade. But you can place a chicken coop on dirt, concrete or any other level surface that provides a solid floor under the coop and doesn't overheat in summer, like asphalt can. So long as the coop is in an area where the chickens can not escape through the floor and the ground is high enough to prevent flooding, your chicken coop will be just fine.

    Grass

    • Chickens do not have to have access to grass to survive, but they do benefit from it. Grass, as well as all the little creatures that live in grass, are a normal and healthy part of a free-range chicken's diet. Chickens who have access to grass will have more varied and natural nutrition, which can benefit both the health of the chickens and the quality of their eggs.

    Grass Growth

    • Placing your chicken coop on a grassy area does not mean the grass will continue to grow after the coop has been placed. When too many chickens are walking around, pecking and generally trampling a small area of grass, the grass will die off and you will be left with a dirt floor under your chicken coop. Grass can grow only so fast; if you have too many chickens for the grass to support, then the grass will die off under your coop. Too much chicken waste in an overcrowded coop can also contribute to the death of the grass, though in moderate quantities chicken waste works well to fertilize grass.

    Considerations

    • Before you place a chicken coop on grass, think ahead about how you plan to maintain your grass. You cannot spray pesticides or harsh chemicals around your chickens, because you risk poisoning them. Your chickens will eat bugs and weeds, and will generally keep pests to a minimum within your grassy areas. If your coop is full of grass and you do not have enough chickens to keep it down, you may eventually have to mow the coop, which could be quite challenging without moving it.