New to all this

Haulinbass02

In the Brooder
9 Years
May 1, 2010
17
2
24
Me and my wife (and kids) have a little homestead in Springtown, Texas (4.11 acres) and are VERY excited about starting our chickens, goats, horse and a steer or two. (Yes we'll be very busy, but we aren't going all out all at once either!!!)
I am redoing all of the fencing around the property and around the house (don't want my horse on my front porch) and am wanting some opinions on some fencing type. Because we are getting goats and chickens and the fact that I don't want my horses to stick their necks through and eat the grass in the yard around the house, I am planning on fencing in the house using 4"x6" mesh horse fence. I am actually fencing off a sizeable area behind the "backyard" where the pool and swingset are as a separate garden/farming area and plan on letting the chickens free range in this area most of the time with free access to the coop. There will also be a covered run attached to the coop for those times we aren't home or it is raining, etc. I also will have a chicken tractor to put them out on the pasture from time to time.
My main question is this, will the 4x6 mesh fencing be enough to keep the chickens (full grown) in the yard and keep them from hurting themselvess, ie, sticking their head through and getting stuck or do I need to go to a smaller mesh? Goat fence is 4"x4" so I may use that although the 4x6 will be fine for the goats and horses both. Thanks for all your insight, I JUST found this site today and have read more in the past 30 minutes about chickens than I can really process!

On edit, I checked the horse fencing and it looks like the no-climb fence that I want to use has 4"x2" spacing so it is even better.
 
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2"x4" will work fine for the chickens....chicks can get out, but older chickens, no. You're good to go.

ETA: You could add some 1/2" hardware cloth around the lower couple of feet of the fence and keep the chicks in, too. A less durable way would be to add 1" chicken wire along the bottom.

Best wishes,
Ed
 
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Thanks for the reply. I haven't figured out how to deal with the chicks yet, they might just stay in a tractor until they get bigger and can't get out of the horse fence.
 

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