Electric Poultry Fence

[JackE]

JackE, what are you using to keep the grass down under the fence? Our current plan is to run our sheep/goats through first to get the grass ate down then put our chickens on and hopefully only have to move the fencing once a week. Do you think that would keep the grass low enough so that is doesn't ground out the fencing too much?

I use Roundup for the perimeter of the fence. If I was moving the fence around the yard, I would just make a quick pass with a lawn mower. That's what I did for a while when I first got the fence. The fence is easy to move, as you can just pull it out of the ground, move it, and step it back in. But since my fence is never moved, and I have all kinds of other things to be doing instead of moving a fence and mowing a stretch of grass every week, I just went with the easy fix of Roundup.
Maybe with the goats and sheep, you'll have animal lawn mowers that can keep up with the job. If they eat where you need them to.
Jack

 

[ocap]

interesting comments, i will watch and read this often, we have seen fox, coyote, bob cat, skunk and stray dogs on our place and recently became aware of this fencing.

 

[backyardcelia]

i have been considering electric fencing as well, but i haven't been able to make sense of it-- if it will actually make cents, as it were....(or just be an expensive eyesore....)
first, i was thinking (uh oh)
i would have to have some netting overhead as well, for all the local raptors... or do most people just take there chances in that respect?

also, i've wondered..... it doesn't hurt the chickens??

and lastly, i have such a hilly property i wonder if a fox or bobcat could just running jump right over fence and then it would be trapped inside with the girls!!!! ? (i might add here, that after a decade of barely remembering a dream, i am chicken dreaming on regular basis!!! the most recent involving a opossum)oh boy!

any electric fencing info. appreciated, even if it seems like common sense to most ;p (i think maybe i have ptsd from getting shocked by horse fences as a kid!)

 

[SIMZ]

Hi there!

Hawks: An electric fence will not protect from flying predators. We don't have a hawk problem, but we put out a few range shelters for the chickens to get under. I've seen them run under those when a scary bird flew overhead.

Does it hurt the chickens: Sometimes I've seen chickens touching the fence and pecking at things on the other side with no problems. A few times I've seen chickens by the fence squawk and run (very rarely). I don't know what they were doing, but each time it was older hens or the rooster. Overall, I'd say it doesn't hurt them.

I'm not sure about your bobcat question. It gives me a reason to be glad my ground is flat, though.

 

[haleyd]

We have used the electric poultry netting from Premier for both meat and laying chickens. We had serious raccoon/opossum/skunk problems before we got a LGD, and we had no losses while using the netting. One thing is that panicked chickens can fly over it. Right now we are using the netting as a run for our laying flock within the goat pasture, and it also keeps the goats out very well.(As long as it is connected to the charger!) We have a chicken house in the pasture, and the netting fans out from the door. That means the run can't be moved around, but it's big enough that there isn't much need to.

 

[Island Roo]

I've seen plenty of house / barn cats on the outside of our fence but never within - not sure what that tells us about bobcats.

Hilly terrain is a bit more challenging but it can be done using a few extra fibreglass posts and pegs in the ground. I'll try to get a picture of our setup and post it here.

 

[centrarchid]

The effectiveness of electrified poultry netting varies with predator type. Generally it works great against mammals but raptors can be a problem. A producer I work with takes consistent losses of cornish X birds to great horned owls. Dog in my opinion would suppress such losses but he is not comfortable with having dog able to get in with birds.

 

[backyardcelia]

you are all so helpful and i realised, as soon as i had hit SUBMIT on my post, that i had another q., which haleyd mentioned ....chickens flying over it!!!

sometimes i really have to laugh at myself/my thoughts over this whole chicken adventure that i am on... but i suppose i'd rather care too much than not enough! i can not believe the air my ladies catch!!!! (and speaking of the hills, i've been wondering, will they break their pelvis on landings!?! UNTIL i saw a video here of high flying chickens(but then again, that was when i learned about bumblefoot!oh dear) seriously though, my chickens fly 35 feet no problem & then skid for a foot(oh no, will this too cause bumblefoot?)... sometimes they navigating turns!! i never anticipated all of this!

i would love to see any pic.s i am a visual sort, so it helps immensely so, whenever you get to it, island roo!
does anyone use overhead netting? i'm thinking i am just going to go with shelter like SIMZ said, and let the ladies take there chances and hope they smarten up (they seem pretty clever, they run for cover even at a bluejay call.... or a large plane shadow!)

and the neighbor's dog does NOT look like a jumper! but loves to chase squirrels on my property
personally, centrarchid, i am going to consider a dog, but that seems like an even bigger responsibility to take care of the big responsibility i mean, i'd hate to be the kind of dog owner as my neighbor! what about a donkey?

 

[TheDownyChick]

You could clip their wings to prevent flying. If you are considering a donkey, you might want to consider a llama instead. I have heard they are good protectors! I have also heard that a few ribbons tied across the run helps to deter flying predators.

 

[gonyere]

We have a couple lengths of premiers poultry netting, currently set up for our goats to get into the mortaflora rose patches When we had chickens before, they stayed in no problem, and we didn't even have to lock them up at night which we'd always had to do before else the coons/possoms would get'm. I recommend the 'heavy duty' stuff that has two pegs so you can literally just step it in - the other stuff is a little bit harder to set up, especially when the ground is really hard