Really tired of burying fence in clay ground!

[greathorse]

I have had great success with hardware cloth laying flat on the ground around the outside of the run. I made sure it came out from the run about 24 inches. I used some very large landscaping pins to make sue it was very flat to the ground. Grass has since grown up through it and it cannot be seen at all. No trenching no digging, so far it has worked very well.

If a predator begins digging it will encounter the wire and not make any progress. In my experience no predator has been smart enough to begin digging outside my hardware cloth apron.

 

[bethsplace]

we also buried hardware cloth when we built our coop and it wasnt too bad but yes a must our neighbors dogs decided to test it we caught them around it and on the 3rd time they tried to dig in and got snagged and didnt come back I can tell because they were messing up the wood chips we have on the outside from running and jumping around it at the birds

 

[Lollipop]

Quote:
Similar here. I had some plastic latice in 4X8 sheets. I ripped them in half lengthwise and place them under my dog kennel run with 1` in and 1` outside the run. Pinned it in place with rebar. Predators can`t dig in and chickens can`t dig under with all their scratching. So far, so good..........Pop

 

[Bear Foot Farm]

I have had great success with hardware cloth laying flat on the ground

That's the way to do it.

Digging is a lot of hard work for no gain in benefits​

 

[bigoakhunter]

I might investigate one of those trenching shovels or try an alternative method for any new runs or additions. For now it is probably worth it as we have coons, coyotes and neighbors dogs here in the woods.

Sounds like most of us use some method to try and keep the predator's out.

 

[gsim]

Trencher is the 1st class way to go. Another poor man's sollution is if ou have a rototiller, take all but one row of tines off and use it as a trencher. It wont excavate it but it will loosen it up to where it is a breeze to do. I did a 4x5 trench and poured it with concrete after fastening 6 ft 2x4 wire fence and setting it so that it just was below the top of the trench. I used an ancient 40 year old electric mixer I have and a wheelbarrow. Original dirt around trench is undisturbed and pretty hard. 4 courses of hotwire with 5 mile fence charger finished my anti-pred attempt. I also put 24" tall roll of chicken wire around inside of fence to keep coons from pulling my birds thru a piece at a time. Protects birds from electric shock too if they could put their heads thru to get at some grass outside of their pen.