DD opened the coop right @ sunup yesterday & came back inside. She brought our lgd in with her! I have warned her several times not too open it too early. About 9am took a head count & 3 girls are missing. They were about 16 wk old welsummers. No signs of a struggle. My only question is I am assuming it was an animal that travels in a pack since multiple are gone @ a time. We do have skunks, coyotes, bobcats that I have seen @ our place. What do you think got the birds? I really need to get a few deer cameras!
Just because several are gone doesnt mean several animals. A coyote, racoon, or fox will kill several at a time, eat one and stash the rest of them for later. Do you have any dogs and if so is it possible that they killed them?
I have 2 missing this morning as well... i suspect either a raccoon or hawk...i am leaning towards hawk as they were not let out until about 9am. if a raccoon was lurking on the fence or trees it would be easily seen from the street...
I woke a morning last week let my girls out early and within a span of an hour and a half there were 8 missing birds. All that was left were feathers. No noise , no big to-do .Whatever it was hasn't been back.
I was missing one pullet day before last. She disappeared in the afternoon. Gone without a trace. I suspect a hawk, a fox, a neighbor's cat (she was a very small pullet), and even a large snake could have gotten her......
So sorry for your loss. We lost a full grown Red-Sexlink over the holiday weekend. She was there on Saturday, and not there on Monday. Didn't do a head count on Sunday. No signs of struggles or pile of feathers, just gone. Our guess is a human predator as we couldn't find any way that a critter got in or out.
Quote:Yeah.. a coyote can carry off a baby goat with no problem.. so I'm sure three chickens would have been very easy to manage
Stupid coyotes! I know we have a mom coyote lives across the fence. Guy that runs cattle k er there keeps trying to get her-- but No luck yet. The rest of the birds are doing good. No more losses this wk so far.
we had 3 dissapear i found feathers and feared the worst. over the next 3 days they came back 1 by 1 they were beatten up but all have healed nicely and are back outside. still have no idea what got them but we stopped letting them free range and we only let them out into the pen when we are home and outside to keep an eye on them.
