Hopefully covering the bottom 3 feet with hardware cloth is enough -- I guess a dog or similar animal can't grind/bite and levitate/jump at the same time...

That stuff isn't cheap.

i lost 1 hen and 2 chicks last week, i would say that every once in a while you lose to the predator. sucks but that is life after the fall

 :really-mad2:Adam :really-mad2:

Hardware cloth

i watched a racoon chew through it.  i use cattle fencing then chicken wire over it. the tractor is heavier but i lose less so far

We had a mother duck and her babies on Easter Sunday.  We put them in a bushel basket on top of the washing machine, a board on top and brick to keep them during the night.  I guess my parents didn't have plan of where to store. They were in a room with doors closed.

Next morning I was the first to rise and go to see the ducks.  Nothing there!  I could not imagine where they were?  No trail of them.  but in the backyard we had bodies, blood and no heads.  My dad said it was a weasel.  

Our home was in the country, and we had woods on three sides of our home.

I will never forget.

One of my kids failed to put the brick up against the left-side of the door of the chicken house yesterday evening -- I saw the results of that mistake today.

A total loss. All 9 hens were slaughtered by some stray dog or wild animal.

I had bought 9 chicks (pullets) about 2 1/2 months ago, on St. Patrick's Day. All of them were healthy and not a single one died...until today.

We could only find 3...maybe 3 1/2 carcasses total, all inside the structure. The other 5 1/2 chickens? Gone without a trace.

We don't have a lot of wildlife here, so I'm thinking a stray (or neighbor's) dog did it.

I'm still days (or weeks) from finishing a more deluxe home for my...er...chickens (though I no longer have any). It would be done by now if we hadn't received so much rain during April and May. We're in "monsoon season" here. Rain every day, or every other day. The 3 month drought (which we get almost every year) can't come fast enough for me!

I burned the bodies until my kindling supply gave out (which charred them pretty well -- they smell like a barbecue!) and placed them inside a different "chicken coop" (enclosed structure) and secured the door. I don't want some idiot stray dog nourishing himself on these bodies.

The only thing worse than losing all your chickens, is losing your chickens and feeding stray (or loose neighborhood dogs that might as well be stray) dogs!

I'd rather they liquefy and fertilize the ground.

I was going to bury them, but that would be more work. I have enough work to do, which I am quite behind on.

Unfortunately I had to *buy* the original chicks for $3 each (I paid $1 extra to get all hens), plus whatever food they ate is a loss. I don't know if you can even get chicks during the summer -- certainly not at the Tractor Supply store. All the local, private farms around here want a lot more per chick for some reason. Maybe I'll place an ad on Craigslist or something.

My kids were getting pretty good at taking care of them too. That's why I got them, of course: for the rural livestock learning experience. My oldest 2 girls were the best at handling them. They liked to go in the cage and play with them.

But first I have to get that fenced-in chicken run built, in between thunderstorms!

Today was not a good day for me.

Matthew, you should buy full grown hens or pullets this time of year.  Ad on Craig's list should bring results.  

Thanks for all your prayers.

Here is a bit of a follow-up:

I placed an ad on Craigslist, asking if anyone had a chicken or two to spare (mostly for the kids' sake).

One lady let us come to her property and catch 5 chickens (which were all free ranging on her property) with a net, plus we got 12 chicks from her. She actually gave us that many birds! The kids are the most excited about having chicks again. It's easy to raise chicks this time of year, as we don't even need a heat lamp! Highs in the 90's and lows in the 70's, but they're in a metal shed so it stays warm all day.

Then several days later, another couple donated 3 Bielefelder roosters. I will only be able to keep one of them, but the couple wanted us to be able to raise funds for our chicken operation by selling the other two. They knew we'd need to buy more feed, fencing, etc.

Apparently Bielefelder chickens are highly sought after -- they are actually the product of German engineering!

https://greenfirefarms.com/bielefelder.html

So I guess I have to watch out to make sure these roosters don't try to take over the whole neighborhood or something... Is that a V2 rocket sticking out of the coop?...

Could be a coyote.

^^THIS^^

I visited my sister in Oregon two weekends ago, and they have three chickens. For a few years they had been living mostly in the coop, but since they don't have a vegetable garden this year, they allow the chickens to roam the fenced yard freely during the day. The chickens go of their own volition into the coop at night - that's what they are used to. My 13 year old nephew's job is to lock the coop at night, and let them out again in the morning. It's so nice to be washing dishes, and to look out of the window and see the chickens doing their usual chicken thing - scratching and then pecking the ground.

They have an Italian breed that is quite beautiful in feather colors, and the eggs are green. They aren't supposed to lay that many eggs, but they lay more than the one American chicken (white feathers) that they have.