Recent content by 98cwitr

Idea/plan: Going to put the comets in the coop during the mornings and let the bigger hybrids free range for a while. That way they're separated, have different water and food sources, but can see and hear each other. Hope the hybrids don't get too jealous :p

So I have 4 hybrids (size of meat chickens, but egg layers as well) which are about 3 months old and MASSIVE, and 3 golden comets (tiny little things by comparison), who are about 1 month old. I've been keeping the comets in the garage for safe keeping (we've lost too many to predators at this...

Great advice everyone and thank you. I am VERY new to raising and keeping chickens, so this has surely been a hard lesson, one that I will never forget. Next flock will certainly be kept indoors at night until they're old enough to be outside on their own.

Would need to be a fairly big opossum, in Maryland you have foxes and bobcats to consider. How rural are you?

Wire is less than an inch at any given spot. Scene of the crime was in the near center of the pen (ground floor, not the coop itself). Whatever it was...it was inside. I need to build a front door on the coop portion and lock them in, but should I even go further and bring them into the garage...

Yeah that's plausible. A rat could fit through the wire. I'll look for holes, but no dig marks around the edge of the pen. There is one spot in the top coverd section where a cat could get in, but I'm having a hard time conceptualizing it getting out!

A few weeks. They were quite young. Poor little girls. :( Did go back out there and found two wings buried in the hay. Whatever it was, those little biddies didn't stand a chance.

Very possible, but cats would usually leave feathers behind?

Me? I'd shoot it.

What state/region are you in?

Hello and I wish I could say it's good to be here, but I just lost 6 of my chicks and my poor children are heartbroken. The rest of the internet didn't seem to help, so here I am. I'm in NC, and we have our share of hawks, foxes, raccoons, snakes, etc that pose a threat to backyard chickens. So...