Arizona Chickens

[mydog8it]

Thank you for the input - I ordered the hardware cloth. I told my husband I saw sparrows squeezing through the holes in our current coop but he didn't believe me!

Raccoons - really??! I had no idea. There is a huge burrow behind the garage (must be 10-12" across) and I was thinking it was from a skunk, but maybe not. I'm a little scared now.

 

[Beckyhsinglsc]

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Skunks are chicken predators also. They are in the weasel family. They especially like eggs and young chickens.

 

[mydog8it]

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Fabulous. I'm glad I haven't moved the girls out there yet - they'd probably all be dead. I had no idea we would have to worry about all of this in the middle of Chandler. I guess I'm going to have to drop a hose down that hole and "relocate" whatever comes out. I wonder how my husband will feel about raccoon/skunk wrangling.

 

[cap1717]

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Racoons are nocturnal. Every one of the Phoenix Mountain Preserves has a large population of racoons. They travel in the desert washes, eat dog food left out by people etc. etc. The reason most people do not see them is that they are never "in sight" during the daylight hours, they tend to avoid lighted areas, etc. I have seen many racoons all over town, but especially in the north and east Phoenix areas.

 

[cap1717]

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you are welcome to check with the "fish and game" folks, if you doubt this.

 

[NoSkiveez]

I have not seen any coons before. My friend lives a few miles from me and she had a bob cat stalking her coop, fish and game came out and got it and it made the front page of the local paper.

Eta: I can't spell.

 

[NoSkiveez]

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That is too funny! My chickens always peck at my red toes but so far I've been safe in my pink sweats.

On a separate note, I have a question about chicken wire (1" hex mesh) vs. hardware cloth (1/2" welded wire squares) for a chicken coop we're working on. Everything I can find online suggests using hardware cloth to keep predators out of the pen, but I'm not sure how big of a deal this really is here in the Phoenix area. It seems like raccoons are the reason people recommend the hardware cloth, but we don't have those here as far as I know. Do you guys recommend going with the hardware cloth anyways (about twice the price) or is chicken wire OK?

I use stucco wire (much less expensive) and fencing similar to rabbit fence. I'm not "in the city" so to speak and we have coyotes, dogs that come running thru here and cats. I'm sure that my friend has had a bob cat (with cubs) at her place, I'm sure we have them near the mountain and bet they could make there way here. I haven't had any coop intruders, thankfully.

 

[Mahonri]

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you are welcome to check with the "fish and game" folks, if you doubt this.

I believe you... I've just never seen one.
If there were any in central phoenix, I wouldn't have any birds remaining. I'm imagining that most of them would be found on the outskirts.

 

[pastrymama]

I have to agree on the racoons. I grew up in Moon Valley(north part of phoenix) and every night a whole family of racoons would come down off the mountain and sit on our bar ledge on the outside of the window of the kitchen and eat the dog food my mom would leave out for them. We would stare at them through the window while they stared back at us. I don't live in MV anymore, but not too far from there. We found a baby snake in our pool about a month ago. Didn't find a mama though....kinda rethinking putting the 6 week old chicks out in the tractor 2 days ago right about now.

 

[dofnup]

Do dogs scare raccoons away? I know that when we lived in the Deer Valley area, we had stray cats come into and yard and pee, but then we got a dog and it stopped. Now if I still had Akitas you could argue that it was because they basically hunt cats, but this is a 20-pound Shiba Inu, who thinks cats are weird looking dogs. The stray cats stayed away because of the smell of my dog marking her territory.

Now I believe that the presence of a dog keeps a lot of pests away ... but I could be wrong.

It sure hasn't scared the scorpions away, yuk yuk yuk ...