How good are chickens at escaping?

[BadGardener]

The background: I need to secure my garden so they can free-range, and have a roll of chicken-wire.
Along part of one side is a beech hedge. There are some obvious holes but mostly the hedge looks pretty dense.
I am trying to make up my mind whether I need to put chicken wire along the whole hedge (£££) or just the obvious places where it looks a bit thin.

Are chickens cunning little blighters who will get through where I think there isn't even a hole, or are they more likely to be a bit dim and not very determined, especially given that the food is all here so why would they want to escape anyway?

I have never kept chickens but tbh I would be more concerned about foxes getting in than chickens escaping..............

They'll only be out there during the day when I'm around, so I am not too worried about foxes - in any case I doubt it would be possible to actually foxproof the whole garden, if a fox was determined to get in. The rest of the time they'll be in the Eglu (at night) and the Eglu run, which are supposedly foxproof.

they will escape through the hedge, but they will come back
hth

Yes, they'll escape through the hedge - or work their way up in it and roost there if they can get in. My neighbours chooks did this for weeks until she sorted the chicken wire.

We have got through 2 dozen eggs this week and am currently on the next 8 due to baking. You won't regret it.

it's a lovely thread title, marvellous

Title made me think of Chicken Run. If that was accurate, then they're quite good once they appoint a leader to organize & plan.

LOLOL! I have no cockerel so hopefully they will not get organised.
On the other side of the hedge is my neighbours' garden. They also have chickens, but ones which are not allowed out of their run. Their garden is immaculate....

mine once walked out through our drive and we spotted them wandering up the lane. by the time I'd caught up with them they were tapping on our neighbours front door!!

I've a couple of white stars at the mo and when they fancy a day out they just fly over the electric fence - they play on the kids swings.

Escape artists one and all. They will also, given time, dust bathe next to chicken wire and create a stealthy tunnel underneath it.

If nothing stops them, they will probably come back at feeding time, but think cars, dogs, foxes, cats.....

no no, it's garden-proud neighbours I'm worried about.
Do you think they will hear nextdoor's chickens clucking and really want to get through there?

Well I invested in a second roll of chicken wire, a really long one, and have chicken-wired the entire hedge along one side of the garden. I let them out for a couple of hours at the end of the day and they were so happy to not be in their run any more.... though they were too dim to find their way back inside it and one of them ended up trying to fly onto the Eglu and batter herself against it in an attempt to get in.
Honestly, this lot could never plan an escape....

mine have clipped wings, and while two of them are good and stay in the garden (patchy hedge full of gaps, low height wall), the third is prone to escaping, and the local wee boys are often bringing back the naughty hen. I have been known to walk around the next door park with a bit of dry bread and the pram, calling for the aptly named predator (a fox survivor) to come home...