It’s been a couple of weeks now and so far so good! If anything has tried to get in, it didn’t make enough progress to leave behind any more damage.
Our neighbor’s dog has been back. She tends to show up at our house looking for shelter during storms. It wouldn’t surprise me if she has had...
I’m a brand new chicken mom. I don’t have enough experience to give much advice, but I absolutely second this.
We actually used 1/4” hardware cloth on our coop. It wasn’t enough! On the first night with the girls we had something chew through the hardware cloth! Thankfully, the girls were...
I love our white coop! It’s cooler in our oppressive heat, too. It will 100% be a pain to keep clean, so I get why it isn’t for everyone.
More importantly for this conversation our white coop is the same color as the other outbuildings on our property and it’s the trim color on our house. Is...
Thank you! Happy to be here! Yep, that hardware cloth wasn’t up to the job!
Apparently, 3 layers of protection isn’t uncommon around here! Oh, well. When you know better, you do better! Just glad the girls survived my learning curve.
We are attaching cage wire (1/2” x 1”, and I think it...
So far so good! The bottom 30” is being wrapped in cage wire. The side of the coop that faces away from the house has been done. We also got a camera with an alert if it detects activity.
With all the thunder and lightning this week I haven’t been able to install everything yet. We have a...
Thank for all the feedback. Kinda wish the plans I was following described 1/4” like you just did. Too true around here!
I’ve started putting heavy rolled fencing (14 gauge) over the hardware cloth. My husband is bringing home fence post screws with proper fenders to reinforce the...
Agreed! The hole was in the middle of the piece, but under that was a section where some staples had been popped off. It has stopped raining here, so I’m off to shore things up! Thanks for the input!
Thank you for the ideas!
The lady we got the chickens from warned us to pick up any leftover feed before closing them up for the night. The right half of the coop is actually storage. We do keep their feed out there in a metal feed bucket with a latched lid. Do you think that would be a problem?
It’s funny. I thought I was being kind of a nut going over the coop before they got here and trying to reinforce even the smallest gap. Crazy that it almost wasn’t enough! I like the idea of your double barrier!
It’s 1/4”, 23 gauge. I’m considering an overlay similar to what you have or a hot wire. People abandon their dogs out where we live. In addition to our three, we have a Blue Lacy/Lab mix that showed up starving about a year ago. It’s possible this coop is going to get a lot of pressure...
Thank you! I’m so glad you haven’t had this happen! Hopefully it won’t be the norm.
We think it was an opossum. The hole is pushed in, but not out. No fur stuck in the wires. We don’t think it managed to get in.
Happy to have a place to ask advice from experienced keepers!
Thank you for sharing. That’s a great way to look at it! Guess we better stock up on hardware cloth!
Yesterday, at the beginning of the day they were running away from us. We came out to the coop a couple of times to sit with them and offer treats. By the end of the day they were running...