chain link fence - how do you...?

[ebonykawai]

I're pretty much decided on a chain link kennel, 7.5'x13' for my run. Now, how would I cut a hole in the chain link fabric to accomodate the chicken door? Will cutting it mess up the fabric/unravel it/ruin it?

Does anyone have pics of their chain link run and how you attached it to your coop? Thanks for any help!

 

[Poison Ivy]

You might want to look into the kennels that have panels that you bolt together instead. That way you could buy two sections that have the door/gate built in it. Then you could leave the gate off and put that section up against the coop. I have chain link on one side of my run and we had to nail the chain link to the wood because it had a few breaks in it. But I don't like it but it was free so I can't complain to much.

 

[patandchickens]

Quote:
Oh yes, DO NOT try to cut a hole in it (it is *possible*, if you have a lot of experience working with chainlink and know about stretcher bars and how to properly tension the fence and brace across gate openings, but there is almost never a good reason to do this, and it is definitely not a good idea for you to try!

What you need to do is make the coop be part of one side of the run. Possibly the simplest thing would be to buy your kennel as a kit and then just attach it to the coop with the coop 'added into' one of the sides, so that the result is a non-square run:

____----------------------
| | !
|coop| !
|____| !
! !
! ------
! ------
!------ (this is supposed to be a diagonal line)

Alternatively, you could buy individual pieces, and get two 13' sides, one 7.5' (or whatever) side, and one 4' side (might have to use a gate panel for that and fill in gaps with extra wire)... that would allow you to make your enclosure a true rectangle.

Either way, basically you are just setting up the chainlink to make a pen that has a 4' gap in one side, and that gap is filled by the coop. Attach the panels direclty to the coop if the coop is VERY VERY strongly attached to the ground, or if the coop is not so strongly planted then just 'tack' the pen to it and reinforce those corners of the pen with 4x4 posts or by running galvanized piping across the top and bottom of the gap.

Does that make sense?

Pat

 

[Smitty's Farm]

I have a chain link fence that was donated to me by my brother in law to use for my run. It's 6 ft tall and is 20' x 14'. One of the 14' panels have two gate doors. Like suggested, you may want to by a panel that has a gate to save extra work.

 

[lurky]

Quote:
I dont think you would want to cut a hole in the chain link, do you have a pic of your coop on here?

 

[ebonykawai]

No, I don't, it's a 4x4.

Poop, this seems complicated.

Maybe I'll go back to building my own.

 

[lurky]

We had one similar to what your saying, I'll go try to find a pic.........

hope this helps.

 

[lurky]

My husband made that as a temporary place for my silkies. We had a friend give me the 4 day old babies unexpectedly and he made this for them until they were big enough to join the bantam flock. He used the plastic lattice to fill in the gaps.

 

[MsMcChick]

To add to the question, i have 150' of chainlink in rolls, i've been told it's possible to put it up like regular fencing with T-posts and wooden posts if my corners are tight enough. Anyone ever done this? What works and what doesn't? I thought about running a heavy duty wire through the top of the fence (it's 6' tall) and using that to tighten when it starts to sag. ~Tracy

 

[lurky]

Quote:
I hear it is very difficult to work with. They have a tool at home depot that you can use to stretch it tight. I wonder if you can find any instruction about it on DIY ??