Edith is Missing, and a plea for help

Two big piles of black and white feathers on the back lawn. A third pile in the neighbor's yard.

One drop of blood on the chicken feeder.

A tuft of reddish grey fur snagged on the chicken wire near a hole about 6 inches around.

Red fox.

Now there's no question of what happened to Agnes 3 days ago.

Penny stands alone, nervous little biddy, and I'm a nervous wreck. I have GOT to protect these birds. They are self-sufficient and practically zero-maintenance in every way, but completely vulnerable and helpless against night predators. My chicken-keeping friends in our previous neighborhood have had no predator problems, even when the coop is open to everything all night long. My neighborhood is just a little bit 'rougher', I suppose, on poultry. We're only a few blocks from a restored prairie and protected natural wildlife habitat. I like the idea of foxes having a natural place to live. I just don't like them stealing my birds.

Time to get defensive.

Short term: I installed a solid door on the coop so I can lock Penny in at night.

Long term: I've designed a new predator-proof pen that should be more stylish, easier to maintain, and much more spacious than the current, temporary, woefully naive, and grossly inadequate setup:

Farmer Bob and his ladies are in there just to give you a sense of scale. It's essentially an enclosure that goes around the existing coop. Hardware cloth (1/2-inch) will be screwed into the frame on every side, even the floor and ceiling. The rectangle bottom is composed of 2"x12" lumber, sort of like a raised garden bed, so I can use the "deep litter" method for managing the chicken droppings (i.e. self-composting). Here are a few more views of the same idea:

The top third will have a waterproof cover and fancy fabric "tent" to keep my ladies dry and stylin'. And the pen itself should be large enough for 4-5 laying hens to live out their days in peace without additional running room (though I do have plans to let them forage in the orchard once it's mature enough to provide them shelter/shade).

I will need help constructing this, to be sure. I'm working out a few more details before gathering the materials and sending out an S.O.S to all my local tool-wielding friends. If you are local and you want to help, please let me know if you prefer next Saturday (July 7th), or sometime between the 9th and the 14th.

Power tools. Yeah.