Neighbor hates my chickens- will she do them harm?

[ChristieB]

Hi there, been following for a while, first comment, woot!
I agree throw some poison up in there
We had/have rats in the ceiling, they turn you into a mad person! I completely understand the feeling of wanting them dead before opening any holes but a desperate rat will chew through anything better that they die quickly before any little ones can escape. I say this immediately before going to sort out the newest litter of domestic rats into snake feed and pets lol. Wild rats are a whole different disgusting species in my mind

 

[aart]

You could fashion something...a round downspout maybe.....that lead to a small mesh wire cage, or tall garbage can..or something.
Get the spout and cage all set up ready to go.... then use a hole saw on the eave and shove the spout in.
Just a thought....no easy solution.

 

[TheSitcomGirls]

No noise last night...no noise this morning....2 1/2 days. No tracks next to the building where they are entombed either. No sign of any rat activity inside the building either. The flock block had been eaten and broken up. There were several good pieces of it that were just sitting there. A rat would have taken them away. The chickens are wanting to go outside in a big way, but they are still in for now! We had a dusting of snow last night so there were some tracks this AM...mouse tracks I presume. Again, the game cam caught that same "mouse". There was one set of tracks leading from under a board in the woodpile and another set of tracks leading back. All the rats traps in the wood pile area are covered up with snow now. I'm not going in there!

But the mouse did venture out further than the chicken run last night presumably looking for food. Puppy Mimi followed the trail like a nut all the way around the garage and the goat house and then back to chicken run. I guess the mouse didn't find anything because back to the woodpile he went. It's funny because as crazy as Mimi was about following this trail Lyla and Penny just yawned. I guess through experience they know the mouse is nowhere to be found and they don't waste their energy chasing something that has already been lost!

 

[Cluckies]

Be very careful with your neighbors. This is not about a rooster. This is about hate and control. I disagree with "Bill Mathews" there are lunatics out there as crazy as these people or more crazy. See this story. Some people cannot be reasoned with. Just stay on your side of the fence and protect yourself and your animals. Lock everything up at night with padlocks. I would not trust them at all. I don't mean to scare you, but just be careful.

 

[TheSitcomGirls]

The rats must be no more. I haven't heard a peep... or a squeak... since I took their pictures. Could they really be gone? I suppose I won't find out until it's warm. For now I am going to let frozen rats lie.

Mother Nature has decided that a record breaking blizzard seems like a good idea. We could get 3 feet of snow in the next 24 hours! At 8:30 I'll lock the horses in the barn. They don't like it, especially Princess Grace. I will give her a bale of hay tonight to make sure she has plenty and she will use it trash her stall and throw most of it out in the aisle. She is a Princess in every sense of the word. She prefers to be outside. But I can't say that I blame her.

Grace was supposed to be great racehorse. Her breeding is excellent. But her feet suck. And she is a big baby about most everything. "Ouch," She winces if she steps on hickory nut. I must limp for an hour even though I have thick rubber pads protecting my dainty little feet.

She is a princess, but a racehorse? No, way! But because of her breeding a bunch of people just kept trying for four long years. They kept racing her until her body was broken.

Emaciated and without hope she stood in a stall at Penn National Racetrack. Still, mind you, for sale. Lame and for sale. Rack of bones and for sale in a stall feet deep in manure. A horse who had once raced in Stakes races was now hidden away in the back part of the stable like a dirty secret. That stall was her prison and she dug deep hole after deep hole trying to get out. Back and forth she weaved in a repetitive motion that damaged her rotten hooves even more. But still my neighbor bought her and brought her home. He too imagined that with her breeding she might be able to really do something! If not race, then maybe have a foal. My neighbor didn't have his own farm but he had a handful of horses and wanted to keep them close to his house. So at another neighbor's farm he put up a big plastic carport in an old cow pasture and strung up an electric fence. Then he tried to fatten her up.

I was not in the market for another horse. My beloved grey horse Hutch had just died a year before. We put him down when he coliced. He was 18 and full of melanoma just like so many grey horses end up being. He was the horse of my heart. I missed him like no other creature that I had ever lost in my life. But for whatever reason, I can't tell you why, I went and looked at Grace. Her feet looked like pancakes. She was standing in muck and tried to kick me when I touched her flank. I did not need this horse. I did not want this horse. But I agreed to think about a two week trial.

Then the next day we got three inches of rain in less than 12 hours. Grace's owner called me and begged me to take her now. Their pasture had flooded. She was standing in mud up over her knees and the plastic carport had lifted up in the wind and blown away like a giant jellyroll. How could I say no? She was a free horse. But nothing is free if it eats, my dad always said.

My farrier helped her feet and I tried to tame her. She had been so long without regular human contact that she was very flighty and kicked if you touched her back end. But she improved. I worked with her all summer. When winter came I bought her a new blanket. I will always remember the way she sniffed it. It was like a kid who had never had a new pair of pants. A kid who always had to wear clothes that smelled like someone else.

Grace had once been an up and coming star, destined to do great things. How far she had fallen. That night I went to feed and when I opened the gate to the pasture she whinnied and galloped to me. That's something that happens in the movies often, but in real life not so much. Some horses can be very aloof and this was the first time she every told me that she appreciated my presence. I wish I could say that she went on to be a great riding horse, but she didn't. She will always be a little lame. But it doesn't matter. I'm a little lame now too! So at this stage in my life she works just fine. For always, she can stay here with me. My Princess.

 

[WthrLady]

Fabulous horse..

And no, no way the rats are gone or dead.

 

[missbecky]

Those are super fat rats.

 

[TheSitcomGirls]

We are finally mostly dug out from the two feet of snow we got. I have paths to the chickens, horses and goats. We have a plowed driveway and close to a plowed road down to the horse barn. It's a good feeling to be able to walk somewhere and not be huffing and puffing when you get there because the drifts are so high! One thing we seem not to have is rats in the chicken house! The day after the storm I found a dead baby rat outside the chicken door in the snow down about a foot deep. I think the critter I caught in my game cam was a little baby rat.

But there are still bigger rats out there. I have tracks from the woodpile across the snow drifts around the side of the building to the door of the coop. The tracks had a long tail mark. But it was just one set of tracks. Then today I saw a tunnel outside through the snowman to the right of the coop door. I set the puppy on the tunnel. She rooted around and smashed the tunnel but came up empty. At 4:00 today I set up the game cam in the coop pointed right at the chicken food. At 8:30 I changed the card and nothing moving so far! Please, please let it be the same in the AM!!!

 

[WthrLady]

Through the snowman? What are you running? A prison? Lol.

 

[TheSitcomGirls]

LOL!!!! I was so tired last night.... snow bank...I meant snow bank!! Two feet of snow just seems to make everything so much harder.

No rats yet on the game cam inside the coop as of yet!