A daytime attack! By what?

[azygous]

Your pullet could be hiding. I've had my share of predator attacks, and young chickens are very good at finding very small hiding places, and they remain very still and quiet for hours after the attack.

Look in every tiny hiding place you can think of, between boxes and stuff. I found one pullet wedged between two hay bales, and another time, four pullets hid themselves behind some wood barrels on my front porch. I had expected all to be dead and gone.

 

[andreanar]

Your pullet could be hiding. I've had my share of predator attacks, and young chickens are very good at finding very small hiding places, and they remain very still and quiet for hours after the attack.

Look in every tiny hiding place you can think of, between boxes and stuff. I found one pullet wedged between two hay bales, and another time, four pullets hid themselves behind some wood barrels on my front porch. I had expected all to be dead and gone.

This is what I have been hoping. She hasn't come back yet tho. Last eve when we found the rampage and started looking and calling, they all started coming back 1by1 2by2...but not her. As we were calling and looking, a car went by and laid on its horn, slowing down, so she might have gotten across the road, its a busy 55mph road. I went over there an searched and called. She is the most skittish and afraid of people.

 

[Doobly]

It all depends on how you view your chickens. If you cherish everyone and think of them as solely pets than free ranging isn't recommended. If you see your birds as a flock, with revolving members than loses are certainly upsetting but the gains of free ranging outweigh the bad.

Completely agree. It's a sad ultimatum, mind. When I was little we had free ranging ducks and chickens, out of about 15 ducks and 25 chickens kept for eggs, only one lived to old age. In the UK the main worry (luckily) is foxes, and monthly losses were "normal" in a 2 acre plot. Of course, as a child it was heartbreaking; to my parents they were livestock; to myself; they were dear pets.

Now as an adult keeper of ducks (currently I only have two call drakes, incubating as we speak!), I keep them in an Eglu with an extended run, and I don't let them out unless I'm with them. It's sad, but it's perspective. I get outside with them a lot during the summer months but in winter and when my little boy was a baby I did feel upset of the lack of time spent with them, and the lack of free range they had. On the other hand I wasn't prepared to allow something to kill them, they were both raised by hand, one is 5 and one is 4 and they were my babies before I had a baby!

It's a horribly tricky moral conundrum. Luckily I've never seen a fox in my garden (it's fairly small and walled) but we have an uncountable amount of cats down this road, they even try and come up to the ducks when they're out and I'm with them!

 

[Doobly]

Didn't take pics and I don't have any photos of the coop on my phone. But here is the missing girl!
View attachment 1061695

Oh she's so pretty. Fingers crossed she's just spooked somewhere.

 

[Folly's place]

Maybe. If I thought a person was out there without my permission, I'd invest in that game cam, and locks on the coop and run doors. Mary

 

[andreanar]

Maybe. If I thought a person was out there without my permission, I'd invest in that game cam, and locks on the coop and run doors. Mary

Looking into game cams right now. Do you have a brand suggestion?

 

[Folly's place]

I've never had one, but many folks here have experience and can offer advice. Mary

 

[Top Rooster]

@andreanar i had a very similar experience with predators, missing chickens and such, I came to find out free rangeing is what draws in predators I kept getting attackes from animals over and over to the point where I just didn't let them free range anymore that fixed all my predator problems I haven't had any animals attack my chickens for a year since then, I really do think letting them free range draws in predators.

 

[Top Rooster]

Also during one of my chickens attacks I had one go missing for a few days but later returned a few days later and was fine.

 

[MINDANAO DAVE]

Went to close my coop this eve. Run and poles all knocked down, feathers everywhere and little pullets gone. I found 9, but 1 is still missing. She's the biggest one. No blood anywhere, this happened in broad daylight. I see where the thing crashed thru the netting to get in and crashed thru the other side to get out. I also see a path in the grass where it went around and around the coop looking to get in. All 9 that i found are unhurt, besides a few that had feathers pulled out. I'm in upstate NY. Chicks are all between 9-13 weeks old.
Funny, weird thing is.... both coop doors were shut, and 1 chick was inside coop. But i left both doors wide open. What could have done this? Dog? Please help.

Fox or coyote