Moved from city to country, electric fence/net recommendations?

[outlawfarmer]

Moved from city to country and I dont want to loose my birds as they walk in the fields. I know hawks and such suck, but how should I safety up the hens from ground predators during the day. Electric fence / net recommendations from anyone?

 

[snowflake]

check out premier 1 they have an easily moved netting that is also electrified. If you choose to hook it up. I love mine but I do not have it hooked up. I don't have much trouble with day time predators. always figured it was because we have dogs. I should say had dogs. both were very old and had to be put down this summer. Kids bring there dogs up though and keep things smelling good

I have a couple hens that will jump the fence but you could clip the wings and that takes care of that problem. Have fun.

 

[bryan99705]

Never had much experience with electrified net. Have used a lot of wire, the new poly wire is real user friendly and very effective (ask the pair of 500# hogs that touched mine...once!

or the goat that did a backflip!

or a stray dog that has never been seen again!)

Also check out the pre-insulated step-in posts and they are inexpensive, fast to set up and moveable.

Be sure to mow and clear where you are going to set up at, also make sure there is not another way around the fence like a low hanging branch or a climable building. Run the bottom strand about 4" off the ground (not the top of the grass) run the second strand about 4" about the first then space the rest about about a 8 - 10" to the top of the posts. You should walk the line about once a week and after storms but you should stop about anything but birds. If the chickens don't want to stay in bounds, you can hang some deer netting or fruit tree netting on the electric fence wire to keep them in.

As to the hawks, all you can do is pray and make sure you have a good alert rooster along with several brush piles or hide spots around the property for the birds to duck under.

 

[larkflying]

Ditto on the Premier 1 fencing . . . we love it, and it is relatively easy to move, and looks decent. You do have to move it every three to 4 days when the grass is growing fast - but that can be just a foot one way or another. Keeps stray dogs off of the chickens until you have time to deal with them, and protects from coyotes and silly chickens going where they are not supposed to. Important to get a good quality charger though -- not feed store brand cheap -- otherwise you'll have problems. We are building permanent non electric fences as we have time / money, but we love being able to move the birds to a new fresh location . . .

As for hawks -- a good rooster is great! He'll warn them, they'll all dash for cover . . . I have my chickens in an orchard right now so they have ample cover from hawks and we haven't lost any yet. if you don't have low trees or bushes, you'd have to make some shelters to scatter around, especially if they are far from the farm buildings. There are some hawk deterrents but I haven't used any . . . . my geese seem to help keep the smaller hawks intimidated, but don't know that an eagle would care . . .

 

[outlawfarmer]

Thanks for all the tips, the sale offer just got excepted. So come September 1st its a go.