Fox attack. Electric fence?

[cesargtapia]

Hello!

After 3 months with my chickens happily free ranging around my house, this week I've had a couple of fox attacks. Thankfully, both times I heard the big commotion and run out of the house quickly enough to scare the fox away, but obviously I can't open the run anymore unless I'm doing something outside.

The run is big enough for the chickens to be reasonably confortable (and pretty safe, at least so far), so it's not the end of the world, but to me, the whole point of getting chickens is to let them roam freely and do their thing. They're basically egg-laying pets

I'm thinking of buying one of those electric fences, and move it around my property, but they're not cheap, so I'd like to know if it will work before spending those 300-400 euros.

There are not big predators or raptors around here. I've only had attacks of a fox, but there are also badgers, genets, probably wildcats...

Will the fence be safe enough? The models I've looked are 1.2 meters high (around 45 inches), and I'm worried the fox will be smart enough to learn to just jump it, or dig under it. There are also quite a lot of trees, so maybe some predators can climb them to jump inside the fence.

 

[sourland]

@DobieLover can you advise here?

 

[DobieLover]

I fenced off a large area for my flock using the poultry netting to which you are referring. I jumped three 164' nets together to enclose 1/3 acre and installed a gate for my access and a second for my lawn tractor. So I don't move it around. But I have to mow regularly so the birds have plenty of forage. I have the fence powered with a 10,000 volt/1.2 Joule output charger and it's grounded with two jumpered, 8' ground rods next to very wet soil. I have been running this setup for almost 7 years and have never had a single loss to a ground predator. My cast of characters are black bears, coyote, fox, raccoon, opossum, fisher cats, bobcats, mink and dogs.
The fox will not approach the fence to jump it. It being new, he will want to sniff it. And that is when he will get the jolt of his life directly to his nose and he will spin on a dime and tear off from whence he came, likely never to return. An easier and less painful meal can be found elsewhere.