- Dec 3, 2009
- 21
- 0
- 22
We have four cats, and most of my chicken-keeping neighbors have cats as well. Cats (feral or domestic) are no danger to full-grown chickens. Occasionally when our bratty cat is bored, he'll sneak up on a chicken just to watch it flutter, but then half the time the chicken chases him right back again. They never actually touch each other.
With younger chickens, you just have to know your own cat's moods. We tend to keep chicks penned up til they're about half of full size, and at that point the cats seemed to classify them as farm animals instead of prey.
I would think your coyotes would be a much bigger issue for the free-ranging chickens. Out here, we lose chickens to bald eagles, great horned owls, and occasionally marauding dogs.
Allowing chickens to free-range is terrifically satisfying to me. I keep mine in their yard til about 2 pm, when most of them have finished laying, and then open the gate. Our garden is fenced in, so the chickens can go where they like. One or two will go back in later to lay their eggs in the nest boxes. Toward the end of the afternoon they start hanging out near our front porch and whining for their scratch. We toss it in their yard, they run after it, and we close them in for the night.
With younger chickens, you just have to know your own cat's moods. We tend to keep chicks penned up til they're about half of full size, and at that point the cats seemed to classify them as farm animals instead of prey.
I would think your coyotes would be a much bigger issue for the free-ranging chickens. Out here, we lose chickens to bald eagles, great horned owls, and occasionally marauding dogs.
Allowing chickens to free-range is terrifically satisfying to me. I keep mine in their yard til about 2 pm, when most of them have finished laying, and then open the gate. Our garden is fenced in, so the chickens can go where they like. One or two will go back in later to lay their eggs in the nest boxes. Toward the end of the afternoon they start hanging out near our front porch and whining for their scratch. We toss it in their yard, they run after it, and we close them in for the night.
