Temporary housing for 5 week olds - will Chicken Wire over Cyclone Fencing be safe enough?

[harmonyp]

Time to move my 6 chicks out of the bathroom. We're taking our time on a nice coop, so I'm setting up temporary housing. I have a really nice 6 sided cyclone fence dog run. We are predator heavy - in country, so we have everything - fox, coyote, racoon, you name it.

Would covering the cyclone fence material with chicken wire be safe enough to keep predators out, or do I need to cover in hardware cloth? I know by itself chicken wire is inadequate, but didn't know if the underlying cyclone fencing made a difference.

Thank you for your help.

 

[aart]

As long as any gaps between the cyclone panels are too small to let in a predator strong enough to tear chicken wire, they'll probably be OK. Raccoons might still be able to reach thru the CW/cyclone, so keep them away from the walls. Maybe rig up a small box in the center of dog run so they can be confined in at night.

Is there a concrete floor, or buried walls or aprons to deter the diggers?

 

[harmonyp]

Aart, thank you so much for your answer. No concrete floor, but the floor is also cycloned fenced. I have the all sided cyclone run 4.5'x4.5'x6' - where stranglely the 6' is the high part - rigged to another cyclone fenced area, which is just the four sides about 5' wide by 3' high, and inside that is a pretty heavy duty reinforced plywood coop that's about 4'x4'x4'. The coop is fully enclosed except the front door which is heavy 1/2" welded wire. I plan to shut them in the coop at night. Meanwhile I plan to put 3" chickenwire around the ground surrounding the coop and cover it with firewood. I'm closing any gaps in the cyclone with wire, but for places where there are gaps - like in one place I have a 4" high x 5' wide gap outside the coop, I was going to use chicken wire for that, but then put some wood in front of it as well.

So - every place on the coop that has any hole will have chicken wire over it. I think after looking through prior posts, I'm going to reinforce the cyclone/chicken wire combo with hardware cloth for the bottom 3 feet of everything accessible. Hopefully I'LL still be able to get in.

Then, hoping just the chicken wire in the higher spots will hold. Then again - they'll go into the safe coop at night, and I'm going to attach a 60 watt night light to an extension cord to have on their house at night.

Again, I'd be heart broken with any losses, so if you think every reinforcement should be hardware cloth - I'll do that.

Hey are HUGE compared to the little tiny puffs that fit in the palm of my hand 4 weeks ago. But, they are tiny and defenseless to the rest of the world. I've become so attached to them - I call them my CT (chicken therapy). Watching each tiny personality explode and develop is amazing. How did I not find chickens earlier?

I can't wait to show the chicks to Paulie, our recently rescued American Game Rooster and incentive to adding to the ranch's chicken family (they will end up living in adjoining pens, not put together). I think he'll be so happy to have birdy company.