Hi! We have a backyard free-ranging flock of 15 and have had birds now for 3 years. We started with the girls as tick control and yummy eggs and now are moving onto meat birds. We like the idea of day ranging our meat birds but are curious as to if we really need the electric netting for them? This may sound dumb, but is it more for the keeping the chicken in one area, or keeping predators out? We are planning on closing them into a portable coop at night and letting them out in the penned area during the day and moving the area every week or so for fresh grass and bugs. I am looking for advice on whether the electric netting is necessary or if we can get away with non-electric just as easily. We are planning on keeping the birds 16 weeks or so, then off to freezer camp. We are planning on 20 birds and are going to get heritage birds, not cornish X. Any advice would be greatly appreciated! ThankS!
It sounds like you are going to have a movable fence to keep them in, so the electrical part would be for predators. Depending in how high it is, they can probably fly over the fence whether it is electrified or not if they are properly motivated, but the normal way a chicken leaves a fenced area is to fly to the top of the fence, perch, then fly down. If you do not have a railing or such on top for them to land on you greatly improve your odds of them not leaving.
Our chickens are protected by nothing more than electric netting. They stay on one side, dogs and other predators stay on the other side. The birds go inside the barn at night, but we do not close the roost. The only thing between them and all the little beasties who would do them harm is that flimsy electric net. And, in the two years that we have been relying solely on the net, we have had zero predator losses. (Knock on wood.) I'm a believer in it.
I use deer netting over top of my run where I keep my meaties.. I have hawks and they dive bomb my full grown birds.. So far the deer netting has kept the meaties and my other babies safe..
