I've been in tears all morning because I found one of my hens lying dead right off of my porch about 10 feet from the cage/coop, and one of my roosters is also missing, leaving behind piles of feathers. I should've inspected my dear Kiki's body more closely but I was so upset by the fact that her entire head and neck was torn off I couldn't look much further. I've read other forums seeing similarities between my hens death and others, but I still have questions. First of all, my hen was sitting on eggs so she was locked in a large dog cage by herself. Yes, locked in. It has two latches that are rusty and hard for me to open or close so how can a racoon possibly open it? There has been reports of bears, coyotes, and raccoons in my neighbor hood, but I'm confused as to how they would come up on my back porch ( where the cages are) and break in?? My house is basically surrounding the porch, are predators really that audacious?? I'm just so shocked. And also why would the predator, whatever it may be, kill a hen and rip the head off and then drag away my rooster? It doesn't seem consistent. There is a possibility that Pearl may be alive as this will be his third time "disappearing" and I'm trying to stay optimistic. But anyways, I can't identify one predator because this attack has qualities of several types of predators. Any information would be helpful!
