Description
This modular chicken run plan series lets you easily create, customize, and extend a secure outdoor habitat for your backyard chickens, cats, rabbits, or other small pets. Build a single module, or combine them for more space and limitless possibilities.
Key features of The Garden Run chicken run plan series:
- Includes 3 unique designs that work separately or together (see below)
- Fully predator proof with lockable latches and tough hardware cloth all around
- Carefully designed to simplify building, optimize materials, and reduce cost and waste
- Optional corrugated roof fits the two smaller designs — plus The Garden Ark!
- Works with any coop or hutch — for chickens, rabbits, cats, ducks, and more
- Built with pride. . . by you!
About The Garden Run chicken run plans:
- Instant download
- Available as individual designs or as a complete series
- Complete series plans include 80 pages of illustrations, photos, and step-by-step instructions
- Written for beginners, with simple cuts and techniques
- Includes full tool and material lists
- Includes both U.S. (feet/inches) and metric units (millimeters)
- Compatible with iPad and other PDF-friendly mobile devices
- Bundle with a set of coop plans and save!
- Satisfaction guaranteed
- Click here for a free plan preview
Add a little space to your chicken coop. Or a lot.
The three designs in the series link to each another — and to our coop designs — seamlessly. In fact, they’re just as easy to connect to any chicken coop, hutch, existing run, or housing with the instructions provided in the plans.
Purchase the plans for each separately, or bundled for a cost savings:
QUARTER-HEIGHT
The quarter-height design stands about two feet (0.6 meters) tall, including the base. It hinges open at the top and lets you enclose the most yard with the least amount of materials (see dimensions below). And it makes a great brooder or grow-out pen for chicks, a secure enclosure for your vegetable garden, and much more.
It’s also a good height for connecting other modules to each other and connects directly to just about any coop or structure. For many setups, this is the place to start. (By the way, all the connections are explained in the plans.)
Purchase quarter-height module plans individually here.
HALF-HEIGHT WITH GARDEN TOP
The half-height design stands about four feet (1.2 meters) tall. It has a wide front door that opens outward and a specially designed permeable rooftop garden bed, ideal for growing succulents or small herbs.
Now, the garden top isn’t a roof. Any rainwater that is not held by the soil or sipped up by the plants eventually drains into the run below, just as it would if the top were open-air.
This module will connect directly to The Garden Coop or The Garden Loft as is. To connect directly to our smaller coops, either leave off the garden top or raise the coops up a bit so that their roof overhangs clear the height of the garden top. You can always connect this module to your housing via a quarter-height module as well.
Purchase half-height module plans individually here.
WALK-IN WITH PERGOLA
The walk-in design is a full-height module that stands about seven-and-a-half feet (2.3 meters) tall. The people door opens outward for easy entry.
You can train vining plants up the side and over the pergola to provide beauty, scent, and shade — even vegetables. There are many options inside for adding perches and other interesting features for your pets.
If your coop or hutch doesn’t have a roof overhang (something like the Eglu, for instance), you could connect it directly to the walk-in module. If it’s small enough, you could enclose it within this module. Otherwise, you would connect your housing via a quarter- or half-height module.
Purchase walk-in module plans individually here.
OPTIONAL CORRUGATED ROOF
It’s a shed-style roof that can be built with polycarbonate panels or other corrugated roofing material. Instructions are included when you purchase the plans for the quarter-height module, half-height module, or the complete set. . .
Again, The Garden Run is not intended to be your animals’ primary shelter, but having some cover over part of their enclosed run — either permanently or seasonally — can offer shade in the summer and more space to roam when it’s raining or snowing.
Secure your chicken run. From the ground up.
Each Garden Run design is built on a foundation that protects your pets from digging pests, raccoons, foxes, and other predators while elevating the structure and holding a good amount of bedding.
If you prefer, you can leave the modules open at the bottom and set them directly on the ground, on skids (like The Garden Ark), or over a garden bed. Or you can raise them on blocks (like The Garden Coop and The Garden Loft) with hardware cloth trenched or flared around the perimeter.
Grow something beautiful on top of your chicken run.
From the start, it has been our goal to design structures that allow your animals and gardens to live in harmony. The garden top on the half-height design does this exceptionally well. It’s part herb garden, part green roof, and it provides shade while elevating flowers or succulents to where you can enjoy them more.
The pergola on the walk-in design is another example, where foliage can flow up and over to shade your pets while softening the line between structure and garden.
Connect, configure, and create the ideal backyard chicken habitat.
The possibilities are yours to explore. The best place to start is to decide what you want to build and how it will connect to your coop, hutch, or other housing. The plans include instructions for framing the connection on your housing and adding a pop door, if needed.
Add an enclosed run to your stand-alone chicken coop, built level or on a slope. . .
Extend your walk-in coop with a pergola and a raised herb garden. . .
Dock your mobile chicken tractor to a more spacious yard with gardens. . .
Or create a varied outdoor habitat for your housecats or other small pets.
Whatever your vision, The Garden Run is a flexible way to realize it. And it looks and functions beautifully to keep your animals secure.
Of course, as with all our plans, there’s as much fun in building to the specs as there is in making the designs your own. So feel free to use the ideas, techniques, and sample configurations in the plans as a jumping off point for your own creativity!
Buy your chicken run plans together — or one at a time.
There are two ways to buy The Garden Run plans:
THE COMPLETE SERIES
If you plan on building two or more designs — either now or later — this is likely the best value. The full plan includes—
- detailed overview
- complete tools list
- tips on materials and techniques
- detailed materials lists, cut lists, and step-by-step instructions for ALL THREE modules, plus the optional roof in two sizes
- instructions on how to connect the modules to your coop or hutch
- sample configurations to get you started
You get a ton of information this way (80 pages worth!) at a nice discount over buying the sections individually. Having the full plan gives you the flexibility to create the best setup to connect with your coop, hutch, or other housing, and you can build the modules at your own pace. Bundle it with a coop plan and save even more!
A LA CARTE
If you prefer to build just one of the designs, you can get the plans for just that module. It’s the exact same eBook, just without the pages for the modules you’re not interested in. So you can save on costs by getting only what you need. Click below to see the individual listings:
- Quarter-height plans
- Half-height with garden top plans
- Walk-in with pergola plans
Note, the quarter-height and half-height only plans both include the instructions for the optional roofing.
Also keep in mind that the a la carte versions are meant to stand alone. So if you buy more than one, there will be some repetition between documents, but you can always choose to print only the additional pages you need.
WATCH: Our chickens’ first foray into The Garden Run
We have since added perches, grazing frames, an herb/succulent garden (on top of the half-height module), a small roof, and vining jasmine. Yet even without those features, you can see that the hens are very much engaged in the run right from the start, moving from one “room” to another to forage together or separately.
Frequently Asked Questions
The Garden Run is designed for beginners on up. If you know how to use a circular saw and a cordless drill, you’re more than halfway there. Even if you haven’t, this is a fun project to learn on, as you can start small and add on at your own pace. All the cuts are straight between two points (no tricky angles to measure), and the pieces come together simply. You can do it!
Prices will vary, of course. What I can tell you is that if you were to buy what’s on the plan’s materials list new at May 2022 Home Depot prices (assuming minimum quantities on hardware), you’d pay pre-tax in US dollars:
- Quarter-height design – around $175
- Half-height design – around $300 (less if you leave off the garden top)
- Optional 50″ corrugated roof – around $105
- Optional 74″ corrugated roof – around $120
- Walk-in design – around $510 (Try to get a good deal on a large roll of hardware cloth. See our Buyer’s Guide.)
These estimates may come down as lumber prices stabilize (they rose during the pandemic). Or they may increase a few percent each year.
The estimates assume standard framing lumber (not cedar or redwood). They include paint/sealer. They do not include planting medium for the garden top. And they don’t factor in hardware (screws in particular) that you may have left over from another coop building project or that may suffice for more than one module.
A big part of what will save you money on your project is having a clear idea of what you’re building, not overbuying, and not mis-measuring and making costly mistakes. Solid plans will help with that, of course.
If you’ve read through the plan, have your materials together, and allow time for painting or sealing, you could build the quarter-height design in about a day, the others each in about two days. Laying the groundwork at your site and connecting the modules to your coop/hutch/each other will take extra time.
We designed The Garden Run series and plans for builders with beginner-level skills. The cuts are almost all simple cross cuts (no tricky angles to measure), and the tools are common ones that you likely either have, can borrow easily, or buy. Here’s the list from the plan:
- circular saw (you may prefer a miter saw for crosscuts and a table saw for cutting siding, if you have access to these as well)
- power drill/driver, with various bits
- tape measurer at least 25′ (7.5 m) long
- level (helpful for larger configurations)
- pencils
- pair of sawhorses
- handsaw (helpful for quick cuts)
- hammer
- pliers
- combination square or speed square
- clamps (2) with at least a 3″ (75 mm) capacity
- wire/metal snips that can handle 19-gauge wire or heavier
- ladder (for the walk-in run module)
- sanding block and sandpaper, or a power sander
- paintbrush
- dropcloth
- personal protective gear: work gloves, eye & ear protection, dust mask/respirator, work boots, etc.
- pneumatic narrow crown stapler, with compressor (optional, but helpful given the size of the project)
- heavy-duty staple gun, with staples (optional, could be spring-loaded, for securing landscape fabric to garden top)
- The quarter-height measures roughly 5’w x 3’d x 2’h (1525 x 915 x 610 mm). Footprint: 15 sq. ft. (1.4 sq. meters).
- The half-height with garden top measures roughly 5’w x 3’d x 4.5’h (1525 x 915 x 1370 mm). Footprint: 15 sq. ft. (1.4 sq. meters).
- The walk-in with pergola measures roughly 6’w x 6’d x 7.5’h (1830 x 1830 x 2285 mm). Footprint: 36 sq. ft. (3.3 sq. meters).
That depends on the breeds, your climate, whether there’s a rooster in the bunch, and so on. My best advice is to offer at least 4 square feet per hen in the run, and more if you have it to spare.
The interesting thing about The Garden Run is that, if you build multiple modules, they break up the space a bit and create options for perches, which extends your hens’ usable space vertically. When we added our configuration of four modules to our coop, we in effect reduced the area of yard that our flock was used to having. Yet they have been far more engaged, calm, and happy (not sure how else to describe it) within The Garden Run. And you can always add a pop door to the outside to let them free range.
Most days, they wander around together and congregate in the same “room.” Other times, you’ll see them each in their own corner or space, taking dustbaths, foraging, grazing, or resting.
Absolutely! The Garden Run is not just for chickens. Any small animal that’s housed for its safety will enjoy the added space — and the variety of spaces — that an outdoor enclosure like The Garden Run offers.
Cats like to explore, perch, and observe, and The Garden Run gives them a secure way to do just that. The walk-in pergola module, in particular, lets you add stumps, scratches, and perches at several heights, so your cats can rule the roost!
Yes. Do keep in mind that The Garden Run is outdoor space and is not intended as your chickens’ primary shelter. That said, the garden top and optional roof will help keep snow and rain out of their yard, making the space more usable in winter months than an open yard would be. You can fashion other coverings and put wrap or siding on the sides as needed.
One other advantage is that it keeps your chickens (rabbits, etc.) secure from the hungrier, more determined predators that winter can bring. For much more information on preparing your chickens and their coop and run for the winter, see the winter-tagged posts on our blog.
The predators and pests you have to deal with will vary, but let’s stick with two for now: rodents and raccoons. Rodents will look for any hole to crawl through to get to the chickens’ food, and they can squeeze their bodies really small to do it. The Garden Loft is completely enclosed, top and sides, with 1/2-inch (13 mm) hardware cloth. Anything wider, like poultry netting or rabbit fencing, will not keep rodents out. Anything smaller, like 1/4-inch, could be too brittle to deter predators. At the base, the hardware cloth is flared out over top the ground (or slightly below, if you prefer), then staked down. This makes tunneling down a tough prospect for even the most determined pest or predator.
Raccoons and foxes will dig, pry, and even undo a latch to get into your coop. Unlike rats and mice, they don’t want your chicken feed. They want your chickens. That’s why it’s important to staple the hardware cloth properly and to use the lockable latches on the access door and the egg door. In many cities and suburbs that require a permit to keep chickens, a rodent-proof design is a must.
Yes. The plan does include specs for four nesting boxes (two on top of two), which fit inside the henhouse at the left side. Each is accessible from the egg door. Four boxes should be plenty for 16 hens (they only go in them to lay eggs). If you wanted more for some reason, you could add a couple more in the henhouse. It’s quite roomy.
If you’re interested in adding external nest boxes to your chicken coop, see our free exterior nesting box plans for guidance. (Review these plans before framing your coop, as it will alter how you frame the left wall of the henhouse.) These were written for The Garden Coop, but the same principles will apply. You can add these nest boxes to the sides or back of the henhouse.
Each design has convenient access for cleaning, either from the top or the side. How often you clean it out is up to you. I prefer to let a nice deep litter build up, which takes a long while. The bases of the modules are intended to hold a good amount of bedding/compost.
You can typically get the store to make some cuts for you so that your materials will fit in your vehicle. I wouldn’t expect much more, but you never know. In any event, the cuts in these plans are all straightforward. If you feel you need help, consider hiring a local handyman/woman. They’ll appreciate the work!
We only offer our plans as ebooks in the PDF format. This lets us get them out quickly and neatly, and it keep costs down for everyone. Past customers whose computer setups were not ideal have said they forwarded the file to a friend or relative to view and print. The promise of a dozen fresh eggs goes a long way.
If you order the complete set of The Garden Run plans, be forewarned that they are 80 pages(!) long. You’ll appreciate the detail, and you can choose what to print and when. Maybe print on the back of scrap paper if you have it.
Yes. Because our chicken coop plan eBooks come as PDF files, they are fully compatible with the iPad and any other PDF-friendly mobile device. Learn more at this post on our blog.
Yes to both! The Garden Run plan is universal, actually, so it includes both U.S. and metric materials lists as well as U.S. and metric measurements throughout. So whether you work in feet/inches or millimeters (or a combination of the two), this plan has you covered.
You can purchase your chicken run plans using most international currencies and credit cards.
You can certainly add a solid or corrugated roof to the walk-in module, though our plans only show how to do this for the quarter- and half-height designs. We haven’t worked this out exactly, but essentially you would. . .
- Cut the three rafters from two-by-eights or two-by-tens and give them a slope by making a long angled cut through the board. The rafters should extend about a foot on either end for an overhang. Each rafter tail should be at least 1.5″ (38 mm) thick (in height).
- Attach five or six purlins perpendicular to the rafters, then the closure strips, then the corrugated panels (see the instructions in the plans for the smaller run designs or our other coop plans).
- Note that if you need to work from a ladder inside the run to attach the panels, you will need to figure out the best moment to attach the hardware cloth ceiling.
- This will make sense as you review the plans, but that center support in the ceiling ideally helps support the center rafter. So you’ll have to figure out a way to have the center rafter attach to the top plates on the front and rear walls until the ceiling is in place. Maybe a couple of temporary L-brackets. Or you can stretch and work entirely from the sides/above to attach the corrugated panels. Again, we haven’t worked out this detail because it’s not necessary for the pergola top as designed. But there’s gotta be a way! 🙂
Customer Reviews
Having completed the garden coop over the fall/winter, these add-ons we're a breeze.
Simply written, clear instructions, with lots of room to improvise if needed.
I'm very happy I added the half and quarter height modules, and may add another section this fall.
The birds love the additional space, which provides an extra hour for them to sunbathe.
Quick build, and I truly appreciated the responsiveness to my emails, as a few questions popped up.
Ordering & Delivery
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The Garden Coop LLC makes no warranties or representations of any kind concerning the accuracy, suitability, or safety of the information contained on the site or in the plans. By using the information or ordering the plans you expressly acknowledge having read and understood this disclaimer and the waivers contained in it, and you agree to hold The Garden Coop LLC, its owners, employees, and agents or anyone else who has been involved in the creation, production, or delivery of this site or the plans harmless from any damages or injuries of any kind to you or any person that might result from your use of or reliance upon the information or from any errors, omissions, or other causes.
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Keep in mind that we’ve priced the plans for personal use only. If you’d like to build our designs to sell, please contact John, the designer, directly. If you feature a coop or run built with one of our designs (even if modified) online or in other marketing materials, please use your own photography, credit the design as “Built using design plans from TheGardenCoop.com,” and link to the web address (TheGardenCoop.com).
Thanks! And contact John with any questions.
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We ship our chicken coop hardware kits via USPS Priority Mail. Please allow 1–2 days for processing and 2–3 days for delivery.
We ship poultry nipples, brooder bottles, veggie feeders, and coloring books via USPS First Class. Please allow 1–2 business days for processing and 2–3 days for delivery.
We ship bucket nipple waterers via USPS Parcel Select or Priority Mail depending on cost, which varies by destination. Please allow 1–2 business days for processing, 5–7 days for Parcel Select, and 2–3 days for Priority delivery.
International orders will incur additional fees, and delivery times will vary based on destination and carrier.
We want you to have the best coop and products for you and your chickens.
If you are not completely satisfied with your purchase, let us know within 30 days, and we will arrange a return and refund.
For digital downloads (e.g., coop plans), email to let us know that you would like a refund, and we’ll send instructions.
For kits, waterers, and other tangible items, please open and inspect your items right away! In the event that your item arrives with parts missing or damaged, you must let us know by email within seven (7) business days of receipt. In the case of damage, attach a photo to your email clearly showing the extent of the damage, if possible. We’ll make it right or arrange a refund.
You may return items to us in new, complete condition within 30 days of purchase for a refund of the purchase price, less our initial shipping costs. You will not be charged a re-stocking fee, but you are responsible for return shipping costs.
Email us first to let us know that you’d like to make a return, and we’ll send you further instructions. We’ll issue your refund once we’ve received your item.
Make sure to follow all manufacturers’ instructions when using tools, materials, or equipment — and use the appropriate protective devices when building, such as work gloves, eye and ear protection, boots, etc. Secure your work as you build. Know what you can handle physically as well, and work within your limits.
Remember, do-it-yourself doesn’t have to mean all by yourself. Share the fun of building with your friends, family, and neighbors!
Please email us.
