It helps, but remember that they a. love digging and b. eating the same things as we do and c. To lay their eggs where you cannot find them.

It's lovely Peter. I want one for ducks, good luck with your chickens, how exciting.

If you want your veggie and flower garden to survive you need to keep them out of this part of the garden. We used to use the Eve Balfour method which has then hens coming out into a smallish area and then going into one of two larger areas. This meant they could scratch, dig up worms and eat grass, and anything we added, in the one larger area then after a period of time we shut that off and let them in the other larger area. Makes sue they always have fresh grass etc to feed on.

Dawnsaunt not sure how well the coup would work for ducks and remember they need access to running water.

2 ounces of fresh greens a day is what's recommended. I give mine a cabbage or a cauliflower, hung up for them to peck at. It's a skeletal core by the end of the day. Meantime they eat frogs, mice, slow worms, slugs . . . . Don't give them bread, it bungs them up, and can lead to a compacted crop. Mine have just come back into lay, and I'm getting 50% from them. As they're getting on a bit, I expect I'll rarely get more than 5 eggs from the seven hens. Worthy

Hi peter,
Love the hen hotel.....
Re your question, organic?
No slug pellets in their area or pelleted fertilisers. No chemical sprays for weedkilling. Common sense should prevail. If you don't want to eat it, then don't give it to them. Apart from that, they will need access to a couple of bowls of water if you are giving them a large area.
But, you can reduce the cost of their feed, boil up veg scraps, peelings etc, AVOID green bits on spuds. Any food you have left over they can have. If you use mash/ meal, you can mix any bits with hot water and the mash and make a porridge. There is nothing my hens won't eat. They love anything I give them, especially pasta, cake, gravy and boiled rice, Any thing I have left over from the night before, even the odd bits of meat and eggs (cooked) all mixed up in the gruel. But I always sprinkle their food with grit.

They will solve the problem of what to do with slugs and snails that you pick off the plants in the garden. Throw them into the chicken run and stand back!

Well done on the coop Peter, it sounds exciting. Maybe you'd like to read Heron's blog with the title Chooks, it was just a few months ago. I loved reading it and I don't have anything to do with chickens! Tried to persuade Ajay to have a Goypedia page about chickens, as lots of people on here keep them, but no joy so far with that.

Good luck with your project.

Peter, it now dawns on me that your hens will only have access to the tiny area attached to the coup. Please, please make sure this is on grass and please try to move the whole thing on a very regular basis.