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Advice on Low Flying Chickens Please

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I am hoping to get a couple of chickens or bantams soon (very excited!!!) but the area they would free range in only has a 3 metre high fence, and I dont want to put up lots of fencing. Are there any chicken or bantam breeds that don't fly very high. I think that, even with their wings clipped, chickens can still fly a bit. Any advice would be much appreciated.

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We have a range of hybrids with clipped wings and they struggle to fly at all, though they can jump up about 1 metre, other people have had chooks that can fly up 2 metres easily. I think it depends on the bird. My theory is that if they have never had a chance to discover they can fly from being chicks, then they hardly use their wings at all. Ours certainly don't seem to know what their wings are for!

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I think ChickenNutter is right - whether or not they can fly rather depends on the incentives. However, the heavier breeds - e.g. Orpingtons - seem less able to get off the ground at all. My Legbars seem to do a lot of low level horizontal flying, but I think you'd be OK with a 3 metre fence.

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Orpies, if they are very agile, will jump and flutter all of . . . let me see . . . no more than 2ft high! Knowing they like to eat for Britain, I would say mine probably half climb that 2ft. I had to trim the maran and the sussex wings because one day they flew over my head, but since they've moulted and grown new feathers they haven't bothered (one year older and wiser now they are much chunkier and more chicken shaped than the nimble chicks that they were). The silkie falls gracefully and the pekins just run everywhere so I haven't bothered with them.

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My pekins don't attempt to fly over the fence. They can fly, as they sometimes climb onto the windowsil to stare at me through the window, but they don't bother very often! Mind you, they don't lay very often either so if you're looking for a productive chicken, they're not the breed for you!

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Avoid Welsummers! Ours cleared an 8 foot wall with ease the other day as she flew back into the garden from visiting the neighbours :oops: She then introduced herself, rather smartish, to our longer term hen residents, by flying straight over their electric fence and crash-landing on top of the cube run - it wasn't elegant but it was certainly dramatic :lol:

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They spend most of their time in the nest box being broody! :lol: No, not very good at all at flying. If you allow them to leap out of your arms they do very good kamikaze demonstrations as they plummet to the ground. Well they flap but go nowhere - bit like me and exercise - the mind is willing but the body fails! :lol:

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3ft is quite low. However most of the time my lovely girls when confronted by an obstacle merely accept it and peck around it, even though in the WIR they can fly up onto the roof of the cube (i.e. at least 3 feet) without difficulty.

 

That said, my silkie frizzle is the worst of all at flying because her feathers curl up the wrong way, including the wing primaries. The thing to do is to avoid providing them with a stepping stone so they can do a powered leap over the fence (which isn't really flying, just sort of jumping and flapping). If they see a staging point, they will go for it.

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All of my hens could get ovet a 3 foot fence. My silkie cross Pipa would fly over regularly amnd then fly back in again. Ex batt Lily could get over the fence by flapping very fast, she would go upwards and land vertically. They are now in a WIR which is 6 ft high and so far I've had no escapes.

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I have 2 hybrid girls who used to wander round the garden until one day one of them managed to get over a 4 foot wall into my neighbours. I gave them another chance (the hens that is not the neighbours) but then I found the same one walking along the wall so I bought the netting that omlet sells (which I think is a good product) and created a smaller area for the girls, although it is also about 4 foot high I thought as it was not rigid it may put her off. However I saw her take a run and fly over. That called for further action and so I clipped their wings. She has still managed to get over once but that is the only time in 3 months so it is not a big problem. I think it may just depend on each individual bird!

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