My birds...NN's, Langshans, Marans and RLW Cornish....free range the better part of 3 acres. I've lost a few, but not many because I have a really good dog....stray picked up as a barely weaned pup from the streets of Tulsa...who considers it her God given job to protect all the birds. At night, they all come in to roost in a lean to addition to the metal shop building. If the weather is not suitable ....if it's 85+ degrees in the shade at dark, the door is left open; an 8 foot section of cattle panel double covered with chicken wire closes the opening, and a security light that normally comes on when some kind of movement activates it is set to be on all the time. Pest sleeps right in front of the lean to and my horse trailer, and heaven help anything that shows up after dark. She's killed ...so far....8 possum and run off several coyotes.
Since the coyotes have now started coming by in two or three packs almost nightly, and coming into my place instead of running the fence in the neighbor's pasture where they have dens, she is now locked inside the house yard fence, which is just 30 feet from the lean to.
I sleep with a loaded .357....with the first 3 spots loaded with shot shells (neighbors are close to my buildings) and final 3 loaded with the real stuff.... on the stand next to my bed, which is now in the extra bedroom right next to the yard gate going into the pasture....about 60 feet from the lean to door. I can, if I have to, shoot through the screen and get whatever happens to be very determined. Also have a .22 LR, .22 Magnum, and a .30-30 to "reach out and touch" whatever needs to be discouraged. Really need to find a shotgun to complete my defense armada. Lived in Montana for 30 years, among three "flocks' of coyotes, and lost fewer birds than were lost the first year in Oklahoma. These predators have NO fear of humans; yours are probably of the same mindset.
In cold weather, the regular metal lean to doors are closed and Pest gets to sleep in the bedroom next to my bed, though I still crack the window a bit so we can both hear better.
Young chickens, not yet integrated into the older flock, also free range the pasture, and spend the nights in my 4 horse stock trailer, (don't have a horse anymore, so can use it however I want to) with 2 x 4 roosts from wall to wall so they can be happy and comfortable, and another 4 x 8 foot cattle panel covered with chicken wire closing off the end doorway, with the regular trailer door braced open. Side windows still have one inch boards closing up the openings from when I last moved.
When it's "cold" outside, the end metal door is closed, with part of a wire covered cattle panel in place above it to stop anything predatory from getting in. The side escape door is similarly handled. The trailer is parked about 50 feet from the security light, and just a little to the side so the birds aren't dealing with the intense light all night.
Has worked out great. Pest dog is 3 or so years old, and now has a young (from this spring) black and white Pit Bull stray who is understudying, and working out well....except when Squirt gets on the hot trail of a rabbit. Then, she eventually....might take 4 or 5 times...busts her way through the perimeter hog wire and is gone for a couple of hours. We're working on that....now that the weather is cooler and I can again work outside without having a heat stroke, a strand ....or two or three....of electric wire is going up around the perimeter fence.
I've tried leaving the coop doors open at night....at a former home....and it was not pretty. Eventually lost some birds. Quite a few. Find a security system that works for you.....older, used horse trailers can be pretty cheap, and offer metal sides that nothing is going to get through. You just need to take care of the two doorways.
I really feel that if you don't close those doors at night, EVENTUALLY, you're going to lose some birds. Not fun. If you don't mind, just keep on leaving the door open. If nothing else, the neighbor's dogwill help himself to your birds.
Good luck.
Edited for lousy spelling. :{
