Keeping the preditors out in the foothills of Colorado

[Evergreen160]

Hi all!

Our family is going to start raising chickens this coming Spring,.... I am very new to all of this! We live in the foothills of Colorado at about 8,200 ft. We have quite a list of predators we need to protect our chickens from - bears, hawks, fox, coyotes, mountain lions,... the list goes on! We plan to have a completely enclosed run made of hardware cloth that fans out into an apron of sorts under the ground.

Anyone have any advice for us? Thanks!

 

[Wyogirl]

Welcome neighbor!!
I used dog kennel panels for my run , dug an 8" trench to bury them, then put netting over the whole run. I have hawks eagles, coyotes, wolves and even a bear once in a while and haven't had any problems for the past 2 years

. I of course searched the forum for days and gathered all the info I possibly could and then picked what I thought would work the best for us.
Good Luck
Ayda

 

[wsmith]

Check out our Colorado thread at https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/68894/colorado/

We are in the process of building our "chicken Compound". Ours will have a 6 ft slat fence all around. At the base of this fence we are placing scrap chain link and welded wire fencing, extending about three feet out. The wire fencing will be fastened to the ground using wire staples. This should keep out coyotes and fox. We don't have any other large predators near us. For hawks, we will be placing a plastic owl out of sight of the chickens. Thhis should take care of the hawks. For small birds, we are placing plastic snakes on roofs. This has proved effective in other areas of the yard. We'll see if it works for the chicken yards.....

 

[chicken-wish]

This sounds like our place. We have almost every predator found in the northern half of the USA here too. We see and hear of them constanly by our house, and this has led to the same concerns for me as well. This is just a summery of what I'll be doing with my coop maybe there are some ideas here that could help? Our coop is not yet built but I have the same intentions for chicken safety as you guys do. I'm planning on burying my fence atleast two feet or two and a half feet (I would go deeper but our water table is at 28" down) to keep the digging critters out including dogs that come by with thier owners (and ofcourse the ppl can't seem to control them), my DH won't fence the yard so I'll have to be extra careful when I let my chickens out to free range for a while. I'll be covering the runs to keep night critters from getting in as easy. I had been wondering what to do about the multiude of various hawks and eagles around our place, and the plastic owl might be a good idea to atleast help. Windows will be covered with hardware cloth to keep critters out and the chickens in if I want to open a window to the coop.

As far as extras go, I'll most likely be putting hardware cloth around the bottom of the runs and it will also be under ground as well for the weasles and the mice. The only other thing I can think of is the trusty shotgun I will be leaving in close quarters for scaring off predators brave enough to come in too close.

 

[citychickx6]

I too am from Colorado.
I am in town so I do not have the bears or some of the other things you do. Darn happy not to have bears I might add.
I am not even sure how to approach keeping them out. I think maybe you will need chain link in addition to the hardware cloth. Maybe a hot wire on the outside of the run?
For hawks the owl may work. Make sure you move it from place to place and get one that he head will bob in the wind.
The apron keeps the digging beasties out. I would make sure to pin it down or bury it in rocks to help keep them from just pulling it up.

I am sure you will have safe and happy chickens.