Advice needed about predators & chicken coops

[PinkFlamingoFrm]

It has been done:

http://www.premier1supplies.com/pou...=electric+poultry+fence&utm_campaign=Bing+Ads

thats crazy! but it is a good idea.. i just worry about my niece & nephew around electric fence.. they are 2 & 3, and they dont listen.

 

[PinkFlamingoFrm]

Our coop is 3 feet off the ground, I think it helps to a certain extent. I my first babies would have run up into the coop they would probably still be here...We didn't have any idea of what we were getting into either or how much this whole adventure was gonna cost. My husband and his projects...I have learn to just let him do.

awww thats sad yeah, its crazy, although it hasnt cost us much yet. just like $25 for the hardware cloth & screws, but soooo much work. Im hoping its finished tomorrow! a comparable coop built by the amish was $999. we found all our wood & tin on his dads farm & he had all the tools we needed. I got a can of paint for it today, its a horrendous pink, i dont think he was thrilled when he got home from work, but I left my nephew pick the paint out, hes 2 and he was so proud, I left the kids help paint, so most of the hinges and such got pink too.. They enjoy stuff like that, so if they had fun, who cares if it isnt perfect. I decided that something so ugly has to have a name & named it the pink flamingo. I do think the stilts help too, im thinking about setting a trail cam out there just to see if anything comes near it at night. There was a 450 pound black bear spotted across the street the other day, thank goodness he didnt get in to the chickens in the flimsy coop they are in now.

 

[andibob]

We just lost four of our six 8 week old girls to raccoon(s)! The girls had only been out of the basement for a week. Every night for that week, I would place them one by one in the coop and lock the hatch. The coop is attached to the pen we built. Saturday night, I decided to leave them in the pen and didn't put them in the coop at night. Our coop is a Ware chicken coop with wood and I think 1" hardware cloth. There is also a pull out metal tray that you can remove and empty the droppings. Our 5 x 5 x 5 foot pen is made of 2x4 wood and 1" poultry/chicken wire, totally enclosed including the top and bottom sections (lots of hawks and turkey buzzards out here). The raccoon(s) actually tore open one of the circular holes in the 1" wire and got through and also wiggled under the chicken wire on the bottom between two staples. They dragged out my girls and killed them. No blood or feathers in the coop, only right outside of it, and blood was on the two areas where they got the hens out. The following night, I kept my two remaining girls locked in the coop, which is made out of 1" hardware cloth and wood. The bottom of the coop is all hardware cloth. The raccoons pulled out the tray that slides in and out under the coop to catch the droppings and ate two toes off one hen's foot right through the hardware cloth. She can't stand on the hardware cloth now because she only has one toe and keeps falling through. DON'T USE POULTRY/CHICKEN WIRE! It's too flimsy for these terrible predators! Chicken wire is cheaper than hardware cloth but would have been more than worth it to keep them from being killed. We are now wrapping the entire coop in 1/2" hardware cloth. If something gets in now, I don't know what else to do. I wonder if a one-toed chicken will survive.

Tragic loss with our first attempt at backyard chickens but I'm not going to give up yet!

NO POULTRY/CHICKEN WIRE! Spend the extra money on hardware cloth!

Well, I feel better now talking this out! The GUILT is horrible!!! A little BYC therapy does the mind good....