Do you lock your ducks up every night??

[mamaof2wi]

Pen Question: If you use hardware wire for your pen do you still lock your ducks up in the house at night?

 

[Amiga]

May I answer hypothetically?

Did I spell that right?

Anyway, around here, since we have some larger predators, I would be okay with the ducks in a pen that has sturdy frame, heavy-gauge metal hardware cloth firmly fastened (screws and washers in addition to u-nails) top, bottom and sides, and backed up with some electric fence. In fact, that's what we did before some of the flock proved to be failing to thrive in the unheated duck house.

A couple of times I heard raccoons yelping after contacting the electric fence.

 

[Welshies]

Yes. We have bears, cougars, wolves, wolverine, coyotes, foxes, dogs, feral and nieghbour cats, great horned owls, hawks, weasels, mink, marten, lynx, skunk, raccoons, and rats. Locking them up at night prevents any mishaps. Some animals will just bulldoze through anything, or material malfunctions, and I will NOT risk that.

 

[Cherib603]

Mine are in a 5x15' chain link dog kennel at night - not locked up in a closed coop, although I'm just now building an insulated, closable coop for winter - but the chainlink is wrapped in hardware cloth with a 2 ft skirt, a solid roof and padlocked each night. Anything less and they'd be scooby snacks.

 

[mamaof2wi]

Ok thanks! I am building a new pen and wondered what others did. I used chicken wire on my one pen b4 I knew it was not predator proof. I lock them up every night, but wondered if I used hardware cloth if I would have to. So really why use hardware cloth if you are putting them away at night?

 

[Cherib603]

Because not all predators come out after dark.

 

[Welshies]

[COLOR=1D2129]Ok thanks! I am building a new pen and wondered what others did. I used chicken wire on my one pen b4 I knew it was not predator proof. I lock them up every night, but wondered if I used hardware cloth if I would have to. So really why use hardware cloth if you are putting them away at night?[/COLOR]

Here is my setup, and no losses so far......:

I have a three sided 244 sq ft horse (run-in) shed. To this I put my 48 sq ft coop (basically a tractor.... 24sqft covered area, and 24 sqft covered and sided outdoor area. I then attached two layers of chicken wire to make the horse shed a run part, with a sunny outdoor part- 358sqft in total. The whole floor area is grass, even under the shed's roof.
So, the fencing is temporary T-posts set so the tops are at 4.5' high. I have 3' chicken wire strung tight (bottom and top) with high tensile wire. On top of that, on the outside, I have 5' chicken wire with 8" apron. The apron is pinned down with gardener's (or landscaper's) stakes. The outside 5' chicken wire is held tight with woven-in high tensile wire at the top, middle, and bottom.
The coop is covered on the sides with 1/2" hardware cloth and the top with 2" chicken wire to prevent hawks and owls from coming in. On weekends this is open 24/7 while I am away.
It works well. No breaches yet. And I love it! Easy for everyone, and my ducks are the happiest animals on earth.

 

[MandBducks]

We have a run constructed with a metal frame with industrial steel panels that build the perimeter wall. These are anchored to the ground with rebar. The top is made of welded wire and we have a skirt of hardware cloth lining the bottom of the steel panels. The ducks have a wooden coop inside of the run that has a small run completely enclosed of hardware cloth. They are locked in the coop nightly and are locked within the smaller run attached to the coop if we will be home late. Can never be too careful, we have mountain lions, crazy javelina, and who knows what else.

I hope any of that made sense

 

[mamaof2wi]

Well some of you have a better set up the Fort Knox

. But really no matter how well it is built if something wants in they will get in..like a mink that is small and can dig. So I will lock them up every night still.

 

[leanntorina]

We have 3 mallards and 3 buffs and we lock them in a house we built from a pop up camper. We have oue fair share of predators here in east Texas at night so we decided the own we built isn't protection enough for them. We have HUGE hogs that run through our property a lot and will tear up fence. We completely gutted the camper and made 4 laying boxes and added some ventilation windows. We even put in a little fan to constantly pull in fresh air at night. They are a little spoiled