There's a special kind of optimism in asking the internet, "Will my two feathered friends destroy my 500 meters of grass?" It's the optimism of someone who has never watched a chicken commit to a mission. The answer, dear reader, is yes. But not in the way you think. Not all at once, and not with malice. It's a slow, methodical, and deeply personal vendetta against every single blade of green within pecking distance.
Let's talk about what 500 meters actually means to a chicken. To you, it's a garden. A lovely patch of outdoor space where you might sip coffee or watch a sunset. To a chicken, it's an all-you-can-eat buffet with a side of digging. Two chickens will not "kill" your grass in a week. They will, however, treat it like a long-term project. They'll scratch for bugs, which rips up roots. They'll dust bathe, which carves out craters. They'll poop, which is great fertilizer, but it also means they'll pick at the lush spots until those spots are just dirt. The grass isn't dying from a disease. It's being audited, one peck at a time.
Now, here's the practical part that nobody on that Reddit thread wants to admit: you're not asking if they'll kill the grass. You're asking if you can have chickens *and* a lawn. Those are two different hobbies. If you let them free-range during the day, you will have a dirt patch with a chicken on it by August. It's not a failure of your chicken-keeping skills. It's just math. A chicken's job is to scratch. Your job is to decide if you like the look of a moonscape or a meadow.
If you still want to try, and I think you should, because the chaos is half the fun, then manage your expectations. Rotate them. Give them a movable coop, or fence off a section of the yard. Let them have their 500 meters in shifts. You'll keep some grass, and they'll keep their brains from turning to soup. Or, embrace the inevitable. Let them turn the whole thing into a dusty run and then plant new grass in the fall. You'll have mud for a season, but you'll also have eggs. That's the trade, and it's a fair one.
So, to TheEntonnoir, I say this: your chicks will not kill all your grass. They'll just wage a campaign of attrition against it, and they will win. The real question isn't whether they'll ruin the lawn. It's whether you'll care once you see them do that little head-tilt thing after they find a worm. You will. And you'll forgive them. Just don't say we didn't warn you about the dirt.