What I might end up doing is penning the layer flock, all mutt birds, as the SFH get so antsy, for some weeks while collecting SFH eggs, then let them all back out again, even though the mutt roosters keep everyone in line. Wasp flew at the door this morning, obviously very angry about being stuck in the coop. The April group won't stay in their day pen of deer netting...they fly out, no matter what I have done, or they race out when you go in to feed and dump the duck pool and the waterers. The mutts won't be happy, but if I want pure SFH, there isn't any other way until these silly girls settle down in a group with a good rooster. I'd like to maybe keep the extra SFH boys in a bachelor pen and then rotate them out with the girls, but Wasp is onerey....I saw him run across the horse pasture to attack his brother, who ran back into the coop to hide. He might get a coop to himself at that rate...or find himself in the soup.
I hope I'm not making them mean, but I have three late May boys that don't mind being caught and carried. They run a bit, don't come up to eat from your hand, but they are not difficult to catch, nor do they struggle when you carry them around. The pullet in with them is quite tame. But....my very aggressive original birds....that is what they were like at this age. I don't free range that group though; they are my blacks, and I keep them penned. Thinking of building them an open air coop and leaving them in it, adding a few pullets to the group. Maybe not being able to follow people around will help.
I have been unable to trap the huge coon. He is trap wise and stole the bait two nights running and has not come back since. But I hot wired my coops with some basic supplies from the store and created an 18 inch high fence with wires 3, 6, 9 and 18 inches off the ground, powered by a charger hot enough to use on my horse fences. DH touched it and said his hand hurt for a couple hours afterwards. But we talked about things...time to add a dog, and I found some GPs and Maremmas not too far away to go look at, all farm raised (but what that exactly means will be determined at the farm visit).
