fort knox

[silkiechick05]

I believe I have a fort knox coop.

Here is a picture, and I will explain...

*notice, it isn't quite done in the picture*

*It has an electric fence surrounding its perimeter (not in the picture).

*It has an apron all around, even the corners

*The wire is 1/2" welded secured with pressurized air gun staples 2" long

*The doors have two latches each, one of the latches (on both doors) has a small padlock on it (hah raccoons open that without a key!)

*The windows use the same wire mentioned above, and wood trimming above the wire solidifies it

*The whole coop is anchored to the ground with cement and bolts

*Support beam a foot off the ground to strengthen the wire (for dogs pushing that low)

 

[Omran]

Quote:
That's a beautiful coop, how big is it?

 

[silkiechick05]

Quote:
That's a beautiful coop, how big is it?

Thanks! Its outline is about 4'X8'

 

[wood&feathers]

Omran, I'm on Furnace Mtn near Irvine. Surrounded by USFS, only maybe 2 of our 108 acres are cleared. As cold as it is I am seriously thinking of taking my son out predator hunting. I need a smaller bored rifle, maybe a .223 or .220 Swift or something.

A friend in Clay City shot a gorgeous red fox in his coop last winter.

 

[Elwar]

I've tried to make my coop as Fort Knox as possible.

It's about 3 feet off of the ground. The 3 sides (with latched doors) with hardware cloth are not reachable without some acrobatics (hanging down from the roof or a huge leap from a tree). The one side that a raccoon could get too is all wood and latched.

Actually, the coop is about 10 feet away from my bedroom sliding door and my dog hears everything outside and likes to go check things out in middle of the night. One night he was barking like crazy and I saw a raccoon standing on my nesting boxes looking around the corner trying to figure out how to get into the coop. This gave me enough time to grab a few firecrackers and run out there with them lit and toss it at the raccoon as he scurried away.

My run is far from predator proof yet though, and I'll need to get it that way by spring when the snakes come. I haven't dug a wire into the ground and the girls have started digging out from under the run as they try to get the green grass that's around the run.

But they go up into their coop every night like clockwork and I shut them in.