Why I’ll Never Free-Range My Chickens Again

[chickens really]

I have a 100 foot electric Poultry fence that goes around The front of my Coop so my Chickens could go out a couple of hours a day while my Dogs are out. I never used it electrified though. It keeps the Chickens in and predators out.

 

[RoosterML]

I was letting them out this year also, one day I took a nap and woke up to three less chickens. Caught everything on house security footage. It was a Coyote in the middle of the day. Now they only are let out when I am outside cutting the lawn things like that. Yesterday at 3pm I hear the chickens go crazy in the run all 10 lined up to take on the Fox. First I seen around. Damn thing caught me lifting up the .22 needless to say "to be continued".
I could have easily taken a picture but like I said in another post not that long ago. The camera will be the second thing I grab. All I needed was 3 more seconds.

 

[RoosterML]

To the OP can you add a third option to your vote? Maybe" supervised free range"

 

[dpenning]

I don’t truly free range because my dog is my biggest predator. They do have a yard that is their own that is 30’ x 100’ ish that has a nice big Bradford pear tree and their yard is uncovered. I don’t think I have ever lost a bird to an aerial predator.

 

[BantyChooks]

I wonder if you would also respect the right of a chicken making its own decisions regarding incarceration, or freedom.

I wouldn't, because chickens have notoriously poor risk-benefit analysis capacaties.

 

[BantyChooks]

I DO have one idiot.
Everyone puts themselves to bed when the sky starts to dim, except for two.
Rocket is one of the Rescue Rangers, and she’s set her stubborn tail feathers on NOT being a coop bird. I may have to learn to live with that, if she’ll negotiate with me on the whole “come down here and eat with the flock” part. She was rescued wild, and had probably survived one clutch’s destruction before ending up in a second attacked clutch. SHE goes so high into our impressive fig tree, or the ornamental pomegranate bushes (those will soon rival the telephone poles in height, and are a tangled mess of pencil thin branches or skinnier) that we have no chance of reaching her without borrowing a scissor lift or a cherry picker. She’s evaded every attack that’s come at her, and me trying to bring her back into caged life seems to be causing her more harm than good.
My idiot, on the other hand… is one of two jersey giant pullets. While everyone else is going into the coop to settle into bed from one of TWO ENTRY POINTS… she wanders back and forth between them, honking.
She’s my only honker. Her sister doesn’t honk. Her sister hops right in and goes to bed. My idiot honks, and is utterly baffled, even when picked up and placed directly in front of (or even on the bottom of) the ramp leading inside. She just walks away to go pace back and forth in front of the coop itself, honking.
So… every evening I scoop her back up, plop her back on the bottom of the ramp, and hold on to her while I *make* her “walk the plank. Then I have to hold her there while I shit the door behind her, or she’ll just hop right back out!!
She is NEVER hatching her own.

What a silly bird! I once had one that got lost... in the weeds.... twenty feet from her coop. Took me a long time to get her out.

 

[Shadrach]

I wouldn't, because chickens have notoriously poor risk-benefit analysis capacaties.

Next time one of the chickens here makes an error in judgment I’ll be sure to remind it how lucky it is to have an infallible human as it’s ‘protector’.

 

[BantyChooks]

Next time one of the chickens here makes an error in judgment I’ll be sure to remind it how lucky it is to have an infallible human as it’s ‘protector’.

Not infallible... just better at remembering when there's a hungry dog in town or not.

 

[DobieLover]

I have a 1/4 pen enclosed in very hot (1.2 J output, 10K volts) poultry netting. There is cover from overhead attack and I have a cockerel who is excellent at keeping a look out and sounding the alarm. No losses or even attacks yet. They stay in this pen most of the time. But I do let them out daily. The time I let them out ranges from 1 hour to all day.
I completely understand if someone does not wish to take risks with their chickens. BUT, if you have ever let your flock out and watched them, not for your own enjoyment but to observe their behavior, they are definitely happier to be OUT. Mine will pace the length of their enclosed/covered run when they see me coming as they want to be let out.
I would rather take the chance at a loss. I would rather my chickens led a short happy life than a long unhappy one.

 

[MissChick@dee]

I couldn’t keep mine caged up. I realize the risk. Mine love their run. They spend most their time in there by their own choosing.
I’ll never say never.
But for now mine get out and about.