Chickens and coyotes...

[EddieWalker]

Don't know if you have them around, but raccoons, skunks and minks will kill fowl just to do it. Tear the heads off and leave everything.

I have racoons and skunks, and the racoons are a problem with the guineas roosting in the trees. They just climb up there and grab one. We lost a lot to that before running the hot wires. Every night we lost one!!! In my experience, they grab it and go. No mess, no feathers, no sign of anything. I blame racoons for those because they where roosting up in the trees, and on a few occasions, we found raccoon tracks going to and coming from the tree. I always look for tracks.

The day all the ducks where killed, it happened early in the afternoon. I've never seen a raccoon out during the day, and I honestly doubt they have the speed or skill to catch and kill that many ducks before they could get into the pond. It might have been two coyotes, I don't know. There where coyote tracks close to there, but where it happened, it's grassy and gravely with very hard clay. Everything points to coyotes.

Since putting the hot wire around that pasture, we have not lost a single animal to coyotes or racoons. When an owl or hawks gets one, there are feathers all over the place. Usually in two or three places. It looks like there was the initial hit, then they go up and land in another place, where there is a struggle, and sometimes a third place. There is nothing left of the bird, just feathers. In the last year, I know of this happening twice.

 

[Clint S]

Lost my whole flock minus a rooster and a hen yesterday in broad daylight. 4 MIA and 5 left in the woodline in various forms of dismemberment from heads gone to partially eaten to no visible wound. Two were attacked 15 feet from the house by the looks of the feathers. I am guessing fox or coyotes, but the carnage during the day and out in the open is what strikes me as odd.

 

[EddieWalker]

Do you have dogs running wild in your area? A pack of feral dogs can be worse then anything else out there!!!!

 

[Threepoint]

Our dog brought my wife a LIVE and unharmed kit (young rabbit) once. Wife put her hands out and told her to "drop." Plop. I get flagged down while on the tractor. She shows me the kit and tells the story and then asks what she should do with it. Heck if I knew! Just figured that I didn't want anything to do with it; best to take it back to wherever it came from. So, I look at my wife and told her to have the dog take her to where the dog got it. I thought I was being funny. I hopped back on the tractor and continued my work. Later on I hear that the dog took the wife and kit exactly to the spot where it came from (which was probably about 80 yards and behind the house from where we discussed what to do). There was another kit at that spot, the dog wasn't making it up!

I watch what I say around the dog!

I can see why! Here's another one. One morning a few years ago in our back yard, one of our game-bird dogs brought my wife a newborn baby squirrel, eyes still shut. Evidently it had fallen or blown out of a nest overnight. The dog had a very soft mouth, so the squirrel wasn't injured, but its body temperature had dropped a lot. I hopped in the truck and headed to an animal rehabilitator with the baby in my hand on my lap. It squeaked until it finally warmed up. At the animal rehabilitator's I learned that it was a baby flying squirrel!

On the way back home, I passed my wife in her car. I learned later she was on her way to the animal rehabilitator's with a second baby squirrel! She told me that after I'd left she'd said to the dog "Where's the baby, where's the baby; anymore babies?" Dang if that dog didn't lead her to the base of a tall tree down near the creek, to another baby! We think there must have been a nest somewhere way up in that tree.

 

[Clint S]

There are coyotes for sure, but I would say no to feral dogs. That is I have never seen any and the population density and types of folks living around here would lead me to believe there are none too.

 

[buickanddeere]

Coyote populations here are absolutely maxed out. Very little small game left, the coyotes are now coming into town for feed. Not unusual to find them dead in the winter from starvation or mange.

 

[Clint S]

I am thinking weasel now. Due to the daytime kill, the number killed and the lack of damage on a few other than missing heads.

 

[greenmojo]

Lost my whole flock minus a rooster and a hen yesterday in broad daylight. 4 MIA and 5 left in the woodline in various forms of dismemberment from heads gone to partially eaten to no visible wound. Two were attacked 15 feet from the house by the looks of the feathers. I am guessing fox or coyotes, but the carnage during the day and out in the open is what strikes me as odd.

That's interesting. We've had neighbors in years past that had dogs get to their chickens and thats how they knew it was the neighbors dogs.

Never had a weasel around, other than the neighbor kind. ;-)

~Moses

 

[BoylermanCT]

I found the key to keeping my chickens and ducks safe is electric net fencing. Looks like a volleyball net, and each horizontal wire is electrified. I have coyotes, bobcat, bear and foxes all around, and have not lost a bird in 3 years. I get it from Premier1supplies.com

 

[DieselBound]

Threepoint, awesome story! Dogs are just amazing. Good dogs that is: most dogs are good dogs; lots has to do with their owners (a stable dog is a wonderful thing!).

Here's a picture taken about a year ago of my layers' Run (also shows one of my portable hoop coops):



As you can see I've got lots of trees. Initially I was laying out the new Runs using a tape measurer. A HUGE pain! I now use a range finder and life is much better.