Good points to consider. I think of raccoons as nighttime animals, but you're right...they could be out and about anytime. We are in the city, and we have an alley along the back which is probably a superhighway for chicken predators.
We're now totally sold on the 1/2 or 1/4 inch hardware...
Total newbie here!!! We're designing our coop right now. I have three 1 week-old chicks. We have already built the frame of a day tractor that (we hope) can either be moved around or docked up to the run on the coop to give some extra run space.
The price of welded wire is really making my...