Predator Proof Your Chicken Coop

Predator Proof your Chicken Coop and Habitat

Keeping your chickens safe can be hard work. When having backyard chickens, it’s important to know what your predators are and use materials accordingly to predator proof your chicken coop.

In the city, the most common are dogs, cats, hawks, opossum, raccoons, and skunks. If you’re in the country, you are probably dealing with these plus coyotes, bobcats, and bears.

Use Hardware Cloth

One of the most important things is to use hardware cloth and not chicken wire on your coop and run. Chicken wire is great for keeping chickens out of areas you don’t want them in, but predators can rip through it pretty easily.

Also, if you have windows on your coop for ventilation, replace the screens with hardware cloth.

Our girls love to explore. We first purchased chicken wire for the run but realized pretty quickly it wouldn’t hold up. So the Bearded Rooster uses it in the garden to keep them out of his plants. He learned quickly when he planted cauliflower – within two days, they ate it all.

So what else do we do to keep our chickens safe?

Chickens can’t see at night. When it’s dusk, about 30 minutes before the sun sets, they head to their coop. We lock them up as soon as we can, making sure that nothing is lingering in the run. You don’t want to lock up a stray cat or any other type of animal with them.

Fortunately, one of our family members is home around dusk. If our schedule changes, we will probably get an automatic coop door. I’ve been tempted to get one for the mornings, so I can sleep in, but I just can’t justify it.

Another idea to predator proof your chicken coop is to build it up off the ground.

This helps to keep predators from trying to dig in and also keeps it from rotting.  Our run is not very large so we built ours up off the ground, which gives them addtional ground space to run around.

Add Lighting

We have a solar light set up pointed to their run that comes on at dusk. I’m hopeful that it discourages opossums and raccoons. A motion sensor light would work well also.

Latch your coop and run

Raccoons with their opposable thumbs are known to unlock barrel bolts and dead bolts. Using a latch that requires two hands will prevent them from getting in and a double lock is even better. We use spring locks. I can’t open it with one hand and sometimes it’s hard with both.

Bury hardward cloth or fencing around the perimeter

Many people bury fencing or hardware cloth around the perimeter to predator proof their chicken coop. This keeps burrowing predators from getting in. You want to bury at least 6 inches deep, 12 would be preferable and some people suggest 18.

Our coop sits at the back of our yard and has concrete on two sides, so we haven’t done this.

You could also make a “skirt” with the hardware cloth. Laying it on the ground around the edges and securing with landscape stakes.

Another great deterrent is a guard dog.

Livestock Guardian dogs (LGD) are specific breeds of dogs who purpose is to protect livestock. They bond with the animals they are protecting and become part of the herd or flock.

There are many different breeds of Livestock Guardian Dogs. We have Great Pyrenees. Just make sure they are not mixed with anything but another LGD breed.

Most dog, unless trained or have a high desire to please you, are not safe around your birds. Even Jaxson, still wants to “playi” with the girls. Hunting dogs and dogs with a high prey drive may never be able to be around  chickens.

However, the smell of the dog’s urine and poop will frighten some predators. Our LGDs love to be outside and are in and out of the doggie door all night, which also helps.

What about free ranging?

Our chickens free range unsupervised in our backyard during the day. We feel the benefits of free ranging outweigh the risk of predators. Not everyone feels this way.

To give them some extra protection, we have several places where they can hide.  Our large red tip bushes give them an area to hang out in and there is an old soccer goal in front of the bushes that blocks the area. We also have a pop-up trailer and a deck they can hide under and several lawn chairs placed strategically around the yard if they need to seek cover.

We hung old CDs from the top of the red tip bushes. The reflection is supposed to deter birds of prey and what a great way to upcycle. If you’ve gotten rid of your CDs already or still use them, an aluminum pie pan will work well to reflect the light.

Trudy our leghorn was attacked a few weeks ago. She got away limping badly and missing quite a few feathers. My husband is sure it was a hawk. I found a lot of feathers in the run area that is adjacent to my husband’s garden.

There’s no place to hang CDs around the area so Herb decided to run heavy duty fishing line diagonally from the top of the shed. If a hawk tries to swoop down now, it will get tangled up. I’ve read that hawks can see the line and will avoid it. I’m tempted to have him run it all over the yard, although I’m sure it’s against our HOA regulations.

I felt like our yard was pretty secure but since Trudy got attacked, I’m considering purchasing a trail cam. So, I’ve been researching. It’s hard to protect the girls when we don’t know what happened. We lost a bird last year and are still wondering what the cause was.

Adding a Rooster to your Flock

A rooster is another great resource for your girls. Roosters will crow to alert the ladies of any danger and he will fight to the death to protect them. Unfortunately, we can’t have one in the city limits. If you get a rooster, you want a minimum of ten hens per rooster to avoid over-mating and injuries that can occur.

The latest predators we are dealing with is rats and mice.

The field behind our house was recently transformed into an At Home retail store. Since the mice lost their natural habitat, they’ve taken up residence in our shed which serves as a partial wall of the chicken run. Rats can attack your chickens at night, eating off their toes, or worse. Herb purchased a rolling log bucket mouse trap. Many people have been successful using this and so far, we’ve caught one in it!

To avoid rats, first thing is to secure your chicken feed. We purchased galvanized containers to store the feed and scratch in. Rats will chew through plastic, walls, and sheetrock. Put up any feed at night. I haven’t done this yet. l don’t let our chickens out to free range until about 8:30am. This ensures there are no predators lingering.

If I put the feed out in the morning, the girls try to escape plus let me know how unhappy they are by squawking their heads off. Since I can’t leave them out there for hours without food, their food stays out overnight. If we don’t get rid of the rats soon, I’ll probably purchase an electric rat trap plus a rat proof chicken feeder.

Lastly, snakes, although unlikely, could attack your chickens. They will definitely eat your eggs. Collect your eggs each day and if possible, several times a day to keep snakes away.

In addition to checking your girls monthly for any signs of illness, check your coop and run also for any holes, broken boards, etc. where predators can get in. If you’re in the country, you definitely have to up your game. You may need an electric fence. We hope to move out of the city in the next 5 years, so I’d love to hear about what you’re using.

Last summer our girls decided to sleep on the roost bars in their run and not in their coop. I didn’t mind since the low at night was still in the 80 degree range but now, I have another set of concerns (such as keeping them warm in the winter but since we are in Texas I have another month to figure that out).

Here are suggested products from friends in my chicken group:

Camera for coop:

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Coop Doors:

Rat Proof Chicken feeders:

Rat Traps: