How to Keep Chickens off the Porch?

[MarthaTheRooster]

Hey yall! I'm back with another couple questions. We just put our five week olds out in their new moveable pen, we don't plan on letting them free range for a few more weeks so they can put on some more size. My question is, when I do let these little guys out how do I keep them off my porch? I plan on keeping the pen a good distance from the porch and I will not be feeding them on or around the porch so they don't associate the porch with food. What other precautions can I take?

Bonus question: What about my flower beds? Do your chickens get into your flower beds? If they do, how to you keep them out or stop this behavior? We have a LARGE yard and a even bigger field behind our house so I'm hoping they spend their free time there and not in my flower beds or on my porch.

 

[DobieLover]

Hey yall! I'm back with another couple questions. We just put our five week olds out in their new moveable pen, we don't plan on letting them free range for a few more weeks so they can put on some more size. My question is, when I do let these little guys out how do I keep them off my porch? I plan on keeping the pen a good distance from the porch and I will not be feeding them on or around the porch so they don't associate the porch with food. What other precautions can I take?

Bonus question: What about my flower beds? Do your chickens get into your flower beds? If they do, how to you keep them out or stop this behavior? We have a LARGE yard and a even bigger field behind our house so I'm hoping they spend their free time there and not in my flower beds or on my porch.

They will get on your porch.
They will get in your flower bed.
Period.
Mine wreaked havoc on my property. Decimated my tomatoes and Brussels sprouts. Squashed some of my perennials flat. Pooped on the porch, deck and stairs. They now live happily contained in their own 1/4-acre electro-netted enclosure. Everyone is happier. Well, maybe not the chickens but they sure aren't unhappy.

 

[BullChick]

I haven’t had Dobie’s problem. They stay away from the house unless I feed treats out the door several days in a row. The lawn furniture, LO’s toys, etc. aren’t bothered either. I even have stuff close to their coop they don’t bother.
The flowers are only in danger if they want to dust bathe. If you have more welcoming dust baths around, you should be fine.

 

[woodmort]

Fence!!

 

[A_Fowl_Guy]

They will get on your porch.
They will get in your flower bed.
Period.
Mine wreaked havoc on my property. Decimated my tomatoes and Brussels sprouts. Squashed some of my perennials flat. Pooped on the porch, deck and stairs. They now live happily contained in their own 1/4-acre electro-netted enclosure. Everyone is happier. Well, maybe not the chickens but they sure aren't unhappy.

Mine like to roam too. They stay out of the garden thanks to construction fencing (the orange flimsy thing since I don’t know the name of it). Just today a rooster got on my deck and was crowing until I came out and and shooed him off. Mine also like to roam out front until I go out and they follow me back to the coop. We have 4 acres of grass and 3 of woods and one of lake. They usually stay close to the coop (about an acre of roaming). The ducks (and my picked on hen that believes she is their mother) live next to the lake about 10ft from it. They stay back there and don’t roam.

 

[MarthaTheRooster]

Fence!!

I really don't want to resort to a fence. We live on a large piece of property that backs right up to our family farm so I'm going to let the girls free range during the day. Also I think fences around flower beds are ugly.. I'm hoping with all this space and with plenty of distractions they'll leave my flower beds alone.

 

[Willowspirit]

They will get on your porch.
They will get in your flower bed.
Period.
Mine wreaked havoc on my property. Decimated my tomatoes and Brussels sprouts. Squashed some of my perennials flat. Pooped on the porch, deck and stairs. They now live happily contained in their own 1/4-acre electro-netted enclosure. Everyone is happier. Well, maybe not the chickens but they sure aren't unhappy.

. Yep! Those creatures I'm raising seem to be chickens all right!

 

[DobieLover]

I really don't want to resort to a fence. We live on a large piece of property that backs right up to our family farm so I'm going to let the girls free range during the day. Also I think fences around flower beds are ugly.. I'm hoping with all this space and with plenty of distractions they'll leave my flower beds alone.

You can give a try but don't say we didn't warn ya!
My chickens went EVERYWHERE. They are busy little critters. We caught them marching up the road more than once, like they weren't getting into enough trouble on our property and the two closest neighbor's properties.
I don't fence off where I don't want them. I created a very nice place for them to live and am going to add more 'structure' when the new coop and run are complete.

When I was letting them range and they came up on the deck I let this guy bark his damn fool head off at them. It worked to scare them off the first few times. After that they knew he couldn't get to them and they proceeded to do as they pleased.

 

[MarthaTheRooster]

We'll see how it goes, we've had chickens in the past and they really didn't bother much.

 

[woodmort]

I mean fence them off the porch and anyplace else that you want to protect.