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No wire covering the "end vents" because the entire run has a ceiling of the heavy gauge wire mesh. So nothing can come into the run from above. Even if a raccoon were to squeeze in under the corrugated plastic roof panels, there's nothing he can do, because the chickens are never off the ground. Even if a chicken were to somehow decide to fly up on top of the playhouse roof, (and they never have), the chickens would still be too far from the ceiling for the raccoons to reach in and grab them. (I know the chickens have never been up there because there's never been any poo up there, nor are there any chicken footprints in the fine layer of dust that settles there.) Oh, and also, the run never overheats on sunny winter days; shrubs and shade trees are on the sides and overhead. I have to use a cookie tin heater under the run's water bowl to keep it from freezing. The nippled gallon jug that hangs in the run always freezes solid when it's below 32 degrees outdoors.
The two hens went through all of last winter just fine with this same setup. No frostbite. Running around in the snow to free range outside the run on sunny days, looking for patches of grass where the snow melted.
No wire covering the "end vents" because the entire run has a ceiling of the heavy gauge wire mesh. So nothing can come into the run from above. Even if a raccoon were to squeeze in under the corrugated plastic roof panels, there's nothing he can do, because the chickens are never off the ground. Even if a chicken were to somehow decide to fly up on top of the playhouse roof, (and they never have), the chickens would still be too far from the ceiling for the raccoons to reach in and grab them. (I know the chickens have never been up there because there's never been any poo up there, nor are there any chicken footprints in the fine layer of dust that settles there.) Oh, and also, the run never overheats on sunny winter days; shrubs and shade trees are on the sides and overhead. I have to use a cookie tin heater under the run's water bowl to keep it from freezing. The nippled gallon jug that hangs in the run always freezes solid when it's below 32 degrees outdoors.
The two hens went through all of last winter just fine with this same setup. No frostbite. Running around in the snow to free range outside the run on sunny days, looking for patches of grass where the snow melted.
