RAH, John and Ken, I think I have everything here (maybe duplicates) to do the chickens except the outside pen. When I bought this 10 acres, the previous owners had chickens, horses and a beef cow or 2. They left a LOT of stuff when they moved, even 2 of the tack boxes full of horse stuff. The 6' x 20' x 8' tall coop is built on the outside of the 100 year old barn, there is a door to access the coop from inside the barn only. It has a couple of screen covered windows that have plywood shutters to close up during the winter, and a door so they can walk out and down a ramp to the pen that is also lockable from the outside. Half of one wall inside is covered with nesting boxes.
The outside pen was made of chickenwire, but it was old and failing in spots due to rust, and the posts were starting to rot, so I yanked out the pen and trashed it all. There are multiple galvanized feeders in the barn, both for hens and for chicks, waterers, wire egg baskets, at least 2 heat lamps, and I don't know what all else is there for sure. I have one plug-in electric fence controller that is rated for 1/2 mile, and they left a large solar fence controller that uses a car battery. I removed the battery 10+ years ago but that controller should still be good. I think that's a bit of an overkill for the pen tho. They used that controller for all teh fences that they had here. I have 2 of those 30 gallon? buckets that have rope handles full of electric fence isolators for both metal "T" posts and wooden posts, spring gate handles, etc.
There are both minks and weasels in the area, along with all the other usual predators. Plus a Springer Spaniel that will learn that chickens are NOT like the pheasants, ducks and geese that she is supposed to retrieve.
I'll swing by the local TSC to check on poultry netting for the bottom. I had planned on putting an electric fence wire on the outside of the pen about 2" off of the ground, and another row 6" higher, then 10" or so higher to deter any 4 legged critters from trying to get thru the fencing on the cage. RAH,I haven't looked, how tall is that poultry fencing? I'd like the pen to be min. 6' tall on the sides.
What size (mesh size if I have a choice) netting for the top? I was thinking of using the synthetic "game bird" stuff vs. metal chicken wire.
