I've successfully free ranged for many years without predation problems. I use farm dogs for protection of the livestock and I keep a rooster in the flock at all times. Both are effective predator deterrents. I never close the pop door and my coop is not a bit predator proof. I do not have a stationary run of any kind.
Over the years I've only lost one rogue loner hen to a Great Horned Owl when the hen refused to roost in the coop. Three chicks were lost to a black snake when they were still confined to the brooder pen, but applied moth balls around the coop and never lost another in this fashion.
The benefits to free ranging are myriad...fresh, healthy soils underfoot, no parasite cycling, better overall health, fresh and natural proteins and green forage, exercise, a more natural existence, a better chance of escaping predation than if confined to a pen...it's like shooting fish in a barrel to keep chickens confined to a pen that predators can breech. Out in the open they have a better chance of evading these predations and the dog can actually get to the predator out in the open.
Right off hand I cannot think of the advantages of keeping chickens in a stationary run.
but i let them out in the morning and let them free range untill sundown when they all automatically return to roost.. i have one rooster with them so the eggs might be fertile...anyway my chickens love corn so i came out to feed them some but only 2 where in the pen (i figured the rest were out in the woods where they hang out alot) but what i noticed was i tiny little egg in a cage in their pen! i thought it was Yolko's ( my oldest) but she wasnt in there... when i found the rest of the girls i was missing Yolko and Bonnie( who is my cochin and also older) so i freaked out ran around in the woods calling and crying( i thought they were gone foever!) but then i heard some comotion near the coop and ran to see if something had a chicken. and i found little Bonnie in the woods squaking like mad because she was sitting on an egg and another chicken had gotten too close! she layed an egg in the woods! i later found Yolko way on the other side of the yard under a pile of plywood sitting on an egg! how am i gonna teach them to lay else where????
. From that point forward she was the protector of all things on the farm. Even sitting at the fence when the seven new hens were introduced barking at them everytime one would attack our old ladies.
