Poultry Talk Ontario (pto.ca)

By birds, I mean the chickens and turkeys.
A couple of years ago, I had found and installed some vine netting, 24" high, along the front edges of my flower gardens.
It has not proven to be robust enough. It keeps the hens out but does not keep the turkeys out. The turkeys just walk into it, see that it's flexible, and walk right over it.
Perhaps I may need to use chicken wire, not sure.
Has anyone had this problem and found a good solution for keeping free ranging birds out the gardens?

i put the birds in a wired pen. with a net over the top. nothing keeps them out of the gardens here except containment with roof...

Turkeys just fly right over fencing.

my chickens flew over the fencing too. or tried...and then discovered if they B52-bombered the fence 4 times out of 5 it would knock the fence down, much to the delight of ALL the chickens LOL.
This weekend i'm fencing around the coop that i just put my horrid free rangers in. The horrid free rangers were relocating the mulch hourly. they would literally take the mulch out of the garden faster than i could put it back into the garden with a rake. So. i have some 12 foot livestock fence (it's deer fencing actually) and that is going to be going up around the coop this weekend.

Yeah, I guess it's a tough call, especially since the front covered veranda doesn't have a railing. Either the turkeys or hens can just get on to the veranda, then hop down into the flower garden. It is not a well established garden; that is why I'm so concerned about not having plants scratched out or damaged.
If we ever find solution that works well, I will be sure to post it.

I had some scrap/leftover hardware cloth i just started putting squares down where they tended to make dust baths. It discouraged them but it may not work depending on what you are protecting (we're protecting empty space between well established perennials.)

Totally interested in a solution. I must be a share holder by now in the wire garden fencing sold by Canadian Tire. It does slightly slow them down. I swear my garden at this time of year looks like I’m growing slate slabs, old flower pots, wood pieces and rocks. All stuff I put in their favourite bath spots. I’ve now added twine strung bird knee high around sensitive areas. Seems to work....especially if I lay small branches from shrubs that I’ve trimmed. Protecting the garden takes more time then planting. I made the mistake of calling the birds when I found grubs and then threw them to them. Don’t make the same mistake or you will be tripping over birds every time you’re in the garden. In my defence, when we bought this place 3 yrs ago, the grubs were rampant in the neglected gardens.

Oh the call of the tiller!

Or the lawn mower. As we mow the lawn the guineas from a cloud around it. Between them, the peafowl and the chickens, I just don’t understand why a single insect is on this property.

Thanks for the input. A couple of years ago, I did have to place some pieces of chicken wire on the soil under a section of 2 bushes on either side of a small birch tree. That keeps them out of there. It's just harder to do that in a perennial flower garden. I've already had to replace one heuchera.
Ah well, such is life with letting the hens free range.