No floor on those little Tractor Supply Coops ... are they really safe?

[Europhyllia]

My big chickens free range during the day and go into Fort Know for the night. It has a concrete floor, the frame itself is attached to the horse barn. It's managed with a sprocket drive automatic door. It has both no climb horse fence and small square metal wire.
We've lost chickens to raccoons before and have beefed it up to this level over the years.

We recently got silkies and it feels like the little fluffballs are a whole different ball game. I am not comfortable letting them free range at all. They are like babies to us. So sweet. So little. So gentle.
I think free ranging they could be picked off too easily and we are quite attached.

So right now they are still in the house and I don't really want to move them to the back pasture with the other chickens.

I am thinking of getting one of those little Tractor Supply Coops and keeping them on the porch.
Compared to our Fort Knox coop at the barn this looks really light weight though.

Do you guys feel they really keep a determined predator out? Do they need to be beefed up? Or are they simply useless and just look cute?

Any input appreciated!

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

I wouldn't use one personally. They are pretty flimsy in construction, especially for the price. I have seen where people put them on top of pavers, but I still wouldn't trust them, plus they are too small and silkies can have problems with those ramps.

 

[CluckNDoodle]

They aren't made to last but initially seem fairly secure with the addition of a hardware cloth skirt to prevent predators from digging under. We were given one that was about a year and a half old and it had already started to rot on the bottom corner so that was reinforced and then we painted the entire thing, inside and out with Duramax paint. It made it easier to clean and is holding up much better though we passed it on to another friend and built a much larger enclosure, lol. Even though we had one of the "nicer" shingled roof models it still leaked that we had to caulk the gaps.

 

[trumpeting_angel]

One of those coops might work inside of a Fort Knox run, but not by itself, IMHO. The lack of a floor, general poor construction, flimsy wood, leaky roofs, steep ramp...I read a lot here and there are many problems.

 

[Peepsi]

Do you guys feel they really keep a determined predator out? Do they need to be beefed up? Or are they simply useless and just look cute?

Any input appreciated!

Yes, they're simply useless and just look cute. I wouldn't use one of them, even if it was on your porch. At the very least, you'd have to add a wood floor, and probably some reinforcements to the thing so it isn't so flimsy. And be sure it has hardware cloth, not chicken wire. Chicken wire is useless for keeping predators away from chickens

 

[Europhyllia]

Thanks for saving me the money !

 

[Parront]

Thanks for saving me the money !

I agree with the previous comments. I keep parrots, and if you have precious pets, you might look for an old parrot cage. Sometimes you see them pretty cheap. Here is mine:

As you see here it has close spaced wire powder coated to resist rust. It has legs so they are not in reach of small predators like rats & mice. You would not want one with a perch on top for silkies! Clean out tray below makes it easy to clean.