Tell How Predators Got Your Chickens. Save Somebody Else From The Bad Experience

Has anyone ever lost hens to opossums

We have completely enclosed coops and runs for nighttime, and typically let the hens free-range during the day.

Year one, fencing was 5 strand electric wire (we have horses). We lost a lot of hens to a fox who slipped under the bottom wire. So we installed wire mesh fencing around the entire perimeter - no more foxes.

Year two, we lost hens to small dogs who were coming in through the gates. So we got large dogs and let them roam the property. No more hens lost to four-legged predators, and the dogs seem to have completely deterred the coyotes. Fortunately, all three of our dogs are great with the chickens.

Then the raptors moved in. Red tailed hawks took out half a dozen hens. But the real problem has been the Coopers Hawks - we have big hens(Orpingtons) and we have Coopers Hawks who nest in the area, and who migrate. Really, the only way to be safe is to not let them out at all, or to stay with them while they are outside. As long as the hens free range, we are going to loose them to hawks - really frustrating for me to be consistently outsmarted by a raptor!!

dixiechick6 said:

Has anyone ever lost hens to opossums

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Funny you should ask. I found "non-chicken poop" in my coop the other day. I looked around and found more piles of poop. I check in the outdoor nest box (which no one uses) and there was an opossum sleeping in it. He probably walked in there one day while the chickens were out free ranging. None of my chickens were injured and I was not missing any eggs. However, the chickens are locked in a different part of the coop at night, not the part where the opossum was sleeping. Chances are the opossum was asleep when the chickens were in the run. Fortunately no losses since I do know they will kill chickens. Now I know to be more vigilant when closing the run up for the night.

My BPR, one of the finest hens I've seen, died last night because a predator took her (coyote or raccoon). Those b*stards can get in easy and I suggest just finding and killing them or setting traps. That's what I plan to do.

Sorry for your loss. We "got rid" of a lot of coyotes, and I've told the local hunters i will pay them for every coyote they kill. Still lost the best rooster ever in November after he was attacked by a coyote. Coyoted didn't take him out, but he died later due to infection. We have one of his baby cockerels that is feisty as ever - he'll need to replace his father.

No matter how many predators you take out there will always be more. I wish they would just eat bunnies and...each other!

I'm so sorry for all of the losses I'm reading on here, but then very thankful at the same time for everyone's information. We have a horse barn that we are converting into a chicken coop for our chickens. We are in the planning stages for creating an outdoor run area and I'm so glad I came across this thread before building. I was going to use the obvious (chicken wire) but have now completely switched over to using hardware cloth. We live in an area that has ermine as I've recently discovered, and it horrifies me to think that one of these rodents can squeeze through a hole the size of a quarter and wipe out my whole flock in the middle of the night. I will be stapling hardware cloth over every crack I can find in the barn that's bigger than a dime. Thank you all again for the information. As I am new to raising chickens, this info is invaluable.

I lost my first hen to the other 7 chickens. They turned on her for whatever reason and pecked her to death. I lost two to one of my dogs, they flew out of the run and the dog killed them. I harvested the rooster, and the other four I lost last week. One was completely gone, the other three had chewed off necks. Whatever it was must have got into the holes we put in for ventilation. We didn't think anything could get in, the holes were only a few inches wide. I think it was a weasel, but how could it have got a chicken out of a 3 or 4 inch hole? She was a pretty good sized chicken. Anyway, we are putting hardware cloth over the holes and making sure that there's no other way for a critter to get in before we invest in more chicks. (10 more at the end of June). We also found out our neighbor lost 18 chickens that night. That's just crazy. Gangster weasels.