I agree, hardware cloth only way to go, chicken wire is useless, dumb name if you ask me.
We put down cement blocks covered with construction grade sand as floor base for run under our coop and hardware cloth all around. That is too small for snakes, rats, mice or raccoons to even reach through to grab chickens, which they can do with chicken wire or other wider wire.

That's a good coop, Sue. Love the colors too!

Raccoons ripped through my chicken wire and pecked off my chickens 1 by 1 then moved on to the ducks. My neighbor is now going through the same thing we did. If we ever do chickens again we will be using a solar electric poultry fencing like this.

The problem here is not the chicken wire, but that the raccoons pull it off the posts. Couldn't they do that to hardware cloth too?

Not if you use really heavy fasteners to make sure it can't be pulled apart. Use lots of them too. They can't be a foot apart. You have to really overkill it when you're trying to keep out predators. I like the idea of the electric fences out away from where the chickens are, just to keep them totally out of the area.

We tried electric fencing for the goats once. It's almost 100% sand here, and they didn't zap at all. We have many problems here, don't we?

Yes, ours is stapled down every few inches and then hubby added those wood slats over the edges, (painted lime green in my photo) so nothing can even get underneath the edge.
The nesting box, (with the laying area on a slant to allow eggs to roll down) has a swivel latch on the right side for that drop down access door, that latch has a clip on it so the raccoons can't open it. In the summer, we prop open the windows slightly, those have hardware cloth.
Raccoons are very clever, as you know, they can manipulate their paws into all kinds of things so you have to think of all the potential possibilities, Google them, inform yourself of all those possibilities, and then prepare for them before tragedy strikes. We lost two when I forgot to close coop door one night, a fox came in at 7:30 in the morning. We now have an automatic door opener that runs on solar power, set to open in AM and then after they return to coop, it's adjusted to the sunrise and set throughout the year. Still has a potential of having a critter sneak in if they time it right but so far so good.
I try not to think about how expensive their eggs are!

I agree with your last sentence! Having chickens for their eggs isn't cheaper by any means! I do love them , and think the eggs do taste better. It's comforting to know what they've been eating and how they've been treated. Commercial chicken farming is pretty scary now.

Gross alert........






We got the monster:

Excellent!!

Update on my chickens. They each have 1 broken leg after being caught by a nasty raccoon, but now, after a week or so, they are both standing up on one leg. They will probably always be caged instead of in the coop with other chickens, but will have a buddy anyway.

What a shame, but at least they're alive. We had a chicken with a broken leg once. He got around just fine, despite the injury.

texaskitty111 said:Our new chickens are 3 months old, and too big for this horrid night snake to eat. But, it keeps catching and suffocating them. We have now lost 3. Never had this problem with snakes before, even with the bantams which are smaller than these are now. I have no idea how to catch this snake so we can shoot it. Can't stay up all night for days. Can't keep it out of the coop, they can get anywhere, around anything, up anything. The chickens sleep 6' up and it pulls them off the roost. Any ideas?

Have had the same problem. Probably a texas rat snake and those suckers get big! This is my last battle fought with a machete.

The one before, i shot but my ears are still ringing so im not doing that again. With this last one i figured out how he was getting in while he was making a run for after the first bad whack from my blade.

We try to keep the area free from tall grass and overgrowth, keep using smaller gauge wire and visit the coop at various times. My neighbor who has more trees and undergrowth has caught small copperheads in a minnow trap. You can search for that online to see how it is done

Fortunately our rat snakes just eat rats and steal a few eggs. I consider it a fair trade.

Yes, if they leave your chickens alone, it's a fair trade, for sure. We never had any rat snakes when we had chickens. I don't know if they're around here. I'd love to start up again one of these days.

Hi folks. I've just read through most of the thread. (over several days!) thanks for the information and stories.

We just got a dozen ISA Brown chicks (ordered 10, got 12) and hubby is building the coop and enclosure. (He may have some lessons to learn about chicken wire, but it's already bought so we'll have to see how that goes.) Coop is sized for six according to our county standards, so we'll offer/sell the excess, is the plan.
We are total newbies.

I wondered if I can plant some herbs outside the chicken pen and let them have whatever grows through the wire, or handy for us to cut and put in the pen as well. Oregano, for example, since I saw it in the feed store as a supplement of some kind, and it should grow right through the wire that will extend out on the ground. Or should we keep the perimeter bare? I am experienced with gardening but not with chickens.

Welcome to the addictive world of chickens! As you have already read, chicken wire will keep the chickens in but it won't keep the predators out. The night time shelter especially needs to be more secure. The chickens will keep the perimeter bare of invading vegetation/herbs, but you can give it a try. As for your bonus birds, they are likely to be roosters so plan to include them in the reduction sale. Best of luck with your new project!

I think herbs along the perimeter is a great idea. Anything in the mint family would do well. Chickens love comfrey and will peck at anything they can reach, but if you plant the main root out of their reach, they won't kill it. By trial and error, you will find what they will peck at and what they will leave alone. I have found my hens don't bother with: sweet cicely, fennel, feverfew, vervain. They peck at but don't kill: mints, comfrey, daylily. My flock free ranges at will (they won't stay inside their yard) and so far have not killed anything in my garden beds, although they do stir things up and make a big mess.

I have tried growing spinach on the outside of my chicken coop. If it germinated, the chickens ate it before I saw it. I also created a 10' x 4' wire rack 8" tall inside the coop and planted greens or extra vine seeds in there. They are also eaten if they ever germinate. Chickens can reach 12" thru wire. That's a very tall rack, and I think the soil is too toxic for plants. Let us know if your plants grow.

Thanks for the comments! I do have comfrey, and extra daylilies they are welcome to chomp on (could get those clumps of ditch lilies back out of the far pile of extra weedy junk) and apple mint. I figured as Bonehead said, plant outside, they could eat the parts that try to grow in, for fun. Like texaskitty, I wondered about trying to grow something right in their pen, brassicas, mustard greens, get it started with a milk crate over it, but thinking, that'd probably not last very long. We'll see- having fun learning.

We'll pay attention to that coop. We are suburban but expect fox, raccoon, and black snake may well visit. They are all seen once in a while already. He did get an electric fence - that was first so he could geek out on the electric part. I am not asking too many questions, I don't want him feeling pressured, he needs to be busy, he is retired and golf is only once a week at best. So if they range the yard, it may change my herb planting plans.