Moved to Bear Country! Tips on protecting my flock!

[JustDoyler]

My family just moved out into the mountains of Colorado and the house we bought has a great yard for our chickens, BUT it's only partially fenced in. There are bear, fox, hawks, raccoon, and numerous other predators I now need to worry about with my chickens! I have chicken wire, but what is the best way to ensure that a bear cannot tear through the wire if I section off a portion of my yard with the chicken wire? I just want to ensure that no predators can get to my girls when we aren't around.

Any tips would be greatly appreciated!

 

[JackE]

Chickenwire is next to useless, as far as protecting chickens from ground predators. It's good for containing chickens, but that is about it. Try electrified poultry net. Ground preds get a snootfull of that, and they give up on chicken dinner. I read where a man used it around his bee hives to keep bears away. Good stuff.

http://www.premier1supplies.com/fencing.php?mode=detail&fence_id=93

 

[JustDoyler]

Okay, thank you for the information and the link! Looks pretty easy to set up! Do you know about which type of battery is best to use to charge that fence?

 

[Anndan]

Hey there! I recently just had a pretty terrible bear attack on my chicken coop. The bear killed 15 or so of my birds. I will tell you right now, there is hardly anything you can do to completely protect your coop from bears. They can rip off car doors they can pull apart any wood structure you have up if they want to. My backyard is completely fences with a mix of chain link and wood panels.. Bear climbed right over the chain link and tore the doors off my coop and grow out pen, it was terrible. However, I'll give you some recommendations of what you can do that will most definitely help!!

Depending on the types of bears you have up there hotwires are not going to help much against a determined bear. If you smelled dinner and felt a tiny little pinch on the way it wouldn't stop me!! hehe.. Anyways, chain link is going to help a lot. A chain link run and a chain link roof, with something covering the sides of it like wood or a metal sheet. This will keep raccoons from getting their hands in there and bears from possibly seeing your birds. We recently converted to something like this and the birds seem very safe and haven't had an accident since. Depending on the type/size of bear.. If you have dogs they will likely deter a bear if they are protecting of your home/yard. The bears are here are pretty afraid of dogs so if they are walking around looking for food during the day and they see a dog in your yard, -hopefully- that will deter them.

Anyways, I hope that helps! I know it seems scary and hopeless but do what you can now to prevent any accidents in the future!!