allie
Junior Member
Posts: 206
|
Post by allie on Oct 4, 2010 12:14:32 GMT -6
We have lost 3 chickens in the last week to a fox, which we have not been able to catch. So I went outside to check on everyone and when I came back in I heard our chick that just hatched this morning peeping...from the living room (the incubator is in the kitchen). I look where the incubator is and it is on the floor, open, with blood on the floor. The cats knocked the incubator over (the two eggs that hadn't hatched weren't busted, but I seriously doubt they will hatch now), and drug the baby in the living room. They were both standing over it when I found them. The poor baby is still alive, but bleeding where one of the picked up it. Ugh!
|
|
|
Post by Timbo on Oct 4, 2010 16:48:31 GMT -6
good lord! hope the chick is ok. Need to trap and shoot that fox tho. Are the chickens penned up?
|
|
allie
Junior Member
Posts: 206
|
Post by allie on Oct 5, 2010 7:55:12 GMT -6
We had to put the little baby down. It's leg was broken and a bone was sticking out of it's wing. It was bleeding and looked like it was oozing yolk everywhere. I think the cats must have punctured it's stomach or something We are trying to trap the fox. We put a snare out with the one body we found (headless-yuck!) and it came in the back side and stole the chicken out. The chickens are in a fenced in area, but a lot of them didn't go up in the coop at night. Now we are putting all the chickens in the coop and locking them up in it at night and putting the ducks in a dog kennel at night. The fox is not scared though. I saw it standing outside the pen once in the middle of the day.
|
|
|
Post by gardendaddy on Oct 5, 2010 9:38:05 GMT -6
Allie...Hoping you have a better day today and good luck from here on!
Mike...aka...Garden Daddy
|
|
allie
Junior Member
Posts: 206
|
Post by allie on Oct 5, 2010 11:45:41 GMT -6
Thanks Mike! So far so good
|
|
|
Post by rinksgi on Oct 5, 2010 17:55:44 GMT -6
Man, that is just heartbreaking! Last October I left the gate open a couple of days(it was when it rained so much) and when I went to check on them, there were headless chickens everywhere. I lost about 50. It was gruesome! Are you sure it was a fox? Headless chickens sounds coonish to me.
|
|
allie
Junior Member
Posts: 206
|
Post by allie on Oct 5, 2010 19:13:21 GMT -6
Gina, the land behind the pen is full of overgrown ragweed and there are fox paths all through it. The chicken I found was in one of the paths, the other was gone, but there was a trail of feathers through the pen and over the fence then back into the weeds. We are pretty sure it was a fox, especially since I saw one back there a few months ago. Around that same time we had a bunch of babies disappear, too. We figure that's what got them. It's too dry to look for tracks anywhere, though. Finding headless chickens is so sad! It's such a waste that they kill them and then don't even eat them.
|
|
|
Post by Timbo on Oct 5, 2010 22:28:51 GMT -6
Well hollar at me if you want them hunted and eliminated.
|
|
8bells
Junior Member
Chickens are Revolting
Posts: 137
|
Post by 8bells on Oct 6, 2010 21:06:25 GMT -6
sounds like a 'coon to me...they will kill everything they can, and take the head. A fox, on the other hand will take AND eat what it wants, and leave the rest for breakfast. 'coons kill for sport...they will kill/behead everything they can, and leave carcasses behind. A fox leaves nothing behind. Could be a neighbor's dog also.
|
|
allie
Junior Member
Posts: 206
|
Post by allie on Oct 7, 2010 18:36:30 GMT -6
I guess it could have been a coon, bu there were at least 10 chickens in the same spot and only two were gone. We had let them out earlier in the day and I can't be 100% sure the one that I found headless made it back inside. It was blue and the only feathers inside were white. I don't think it was a dog because whatever it was had to climb over the fence to get in and out. There weren't any holes anywhere. We thought maybe it only wanted the one chicken and was going to come back and get the other one the next day, but I found it pretty early in the day.
|
|
|
Post by rinksgi on Oct 7, 2010 21:47:15 GMT -6
Whatever it was,it's still horrible. I hope you can stop it or them.
|
|
|
Post by chowdownsilkiefarm on Oct 10, 2010 0:09:51 GMT -6
I was loosing eggs ealier this summer and I had a gourd that was the size of a duck egg that I kept in the nest. I went in one day and it had bite marks in it. All the chickens where fine though. A few weeks later I had taken the dog outside to potty and the rooster had all his hens out in the run. since that never happens, I knew something was in there they didn't want to be with. So I went to look and it was a coon. He was removed forever and haven't had that problem again but it wasn't killing my chickens, it was stealing eggs instead. A few weeks ago we discovered one of our guinnea laying in the same spot they sleep at. They sleep in their run facing the chicken wire Apparently a coon or possum pulled it's head through the wire and decided it needed it worse than the bird did because it was gone.
Our pens and coop is closed. The runs are covered. The only time something can get to them is to either break into the coop or get them during the day when they are out free ranging. That coon that was in had broken in at the top of the run where it connects to the coop. I didn't even see how it was getting in till I started pulling on the wire. Sneaky little buggar.
At almost dark we go out and make sure everybody is in their pens and lock the doors. The guinnea we always have to gather up. They don't run away but they dn't go in their pen either. They want to live in the chicken coop but the chickens don't want them to. So we have to either get them out or off of it.
|
|