I made a big mistake when our livestock panels were delivered.
There are lots of different kinds of livestock panels, some with holes
the same size all over and others with various types of small holes at
the bottom. I'd ordered the ones with very little holes down low
working up to normal-sized holes halfway up the fence, but what actually
came just had two rows of medium-sized holes at the bottom then had
large holes the rest of the way up. Unfortunately, I didn't notice
the substitution until the panels were halfway unloaded, at which point
I thought it wasn't fair to complain and figured we'd work with what we
got.
Of course, once we put our first batch of chicks in the starplate coop,
we realized that young chickens have no problem slipping right through
those holes. So we moved on to plan b --- add an expanse of
one-inch chicken wire along the bottom of the panels to keep chickens
in. In some ways, this negates the awesomeness of livestock panels
since it takes as long to attach the chicken wire as it did to put up
the panels in the first place, and the panels will also now be harder to
move. But the chicken wire does keep the chickens in.
And we do get keep many
of the good qualities of the panels. I've enjoyed the way cattle
panels can be curved into any shape imaginable --- a great asset if you
have an irregularly shaped area and want to enclose every inch.
Plus, the heavy metal will keep Lucy from gnawing dog doors wherever she
wants them, and will also allow the fences to stand up to bigger
livestock if we ever get them. Finally, I especially enjoy the way
cattle panels are Anna-friendly fencing --- easy enough that I can put them up all by myself.
Our little flock is now enjoying the first paddock and I'll be adding
chicken wire to new paddocks as they're needed by the pullets and
cockerels. At the moment, there are no gates at the far end of the
pasture --- the chicks are still young enough that they don't venture
that far from the coop. I have a feeling gate-building will be on
Mark's agenda in a week or two, though. That's definitely a task
too complex for me.
Anna, we did the same thing with livestock panels and found that clothespins were a quick and easy way to chickenproof our hog panels long enough to get our Freedom Rangers big enough to be hawk-proof. You can see it here: http://www.muddyhillfarm.com/blog/2013/09/27/meat-chicks-move-to-fort-knox/