Advice/opinion please? WARNING MAY UPSET SOME

[Churkenduse]

I live in NJ in this terrible storm I am on the coast and got the worst. I fixed the (secure)coop new hay, lots of food and water etc. When the storm hit my girls would not come out from under my very low deck. I tried for an hour. I had to dig a tunnel to get them food and water.
Early this morning we had a visitor, some sort of bird I saw it, my dog usually hears everything, the bird, sadly, got my Daisy.

Please understand why I am asking this, I am extremely upset, but I just can't just throw her away. I can freeze her to bury her later.
Now what I would like to know is what do you all do with the lost chickens that predators may leave behind.? She is almost in tact. As upset I am with her death I am upset that she will be wasted. Do any of you feed the carcass to your dogs? You you eat them? Or do you all just dispose of them?

I have never seen one of my girls this way and I am so upset but I do not want her death to be wasted.
Thanks for you answers. Please do not be unkind and understand why I ask this.

Rosemarie

 

[sourland]

Since the talons of a bird of prey are loaded with bacteria, I personally would freeze her for later burial. Your part of the state really got whacked with that storm. I live in the West central part of the state, and we dodged the bullet. Be aware that the hawk (that is most likely what killed your hen) will return so try to get the hens into the secured coop. Good luck.

 

[speckledhen]

I have never lost any to predators, but we sometimes start a hot fire and burn the body or we take it out into the woods as a food offering to other creatures. We used to bury them, but after a few years, it was hard to find good ground to dig in out in the rocky, root-ridden ground. You can certainly process her and consume her yourself, too. Sorry about Daisy.

 

[kfchickenlady]

So sorry for your loss!

Ive had this happen, and taking them to the woods for other creatures to eat is what I do. I personally would not eat anything that was killed by a wild animal, because of the reasons the above posters have stated.

 

[Deanner03]

Ok...apparently we're disgusting, lol. We had a neighbor's dog get some of our chickens one day. We CAUGHT her in the act. We ate some of them.

 

[BigDaddy'sGurl]

So long as you know the predator wasn't rabid (a bird cannot be) then I would have no qualms about eating the bird. You are going to cook it to an internal temperature of 160 degrees anyway, so any bacteria will be destroyed.

I am so sorry for your loss. We haven't lost an adult bird that we could have been able to salvage enough to eat, but if we did we would no doubt eat it. If you feed it to your dog, I would first skin it and semi-process it so the dog doesn't associate the food its eating with the cuties in the coop.

Again, so sorry for your loss!

 

[theoldchick]

I can understand your desire to honor Daisy's death by using her body to help keep something else alive. Seems so wasteful to throw away a perfectly good carcass. Although in America many of us don't like to eat our pets, some of us use our unexpected kills, or culls, to our advantage. Being self sufficient means not being wasteful. I've used chicken carcasses not suitable for human consumption for feeding hogs, used parts for catfish bait, or baiting traps for pesky predators. Even the feathers were kept to create either pillows or line nest boxes. I've seen many hummingbird nests around my place lined with fine down from my birds. My only criteria is to be respectful in the manner of which I dispose of the body. Simply throwing a carcass in the garbage can is a dishonor. And when we lose respect for our fellow creatures we might as well be dead.

 

[Churkenduse]

Thanks for all your replies:
Deaneer I don't think you are discusting, after all I am asking if I can do this, also yours was a dog, no doubt it did not have rabbies.

BigDaddy's gurl, This is my second this past 2 months, I am angry, not at the predator though, he has to eat.

I had a hard time getting to her to take her in the house we have over 2 feet of snow and 5 foot drifts. I had made a nice little tunnel to get to them to bring food. I cannot imagine how the bird got to my hen. It will be impossilbe for me to get them in the coop, they do not like to be picked up. I did get a screen that I clocked the netranc of their "area" they will not be able to come out in the sun but they will stay alive that way.

I have a wonderful secure very large coop I made myself it is chock full of clean hay and food, I just could not get them in, the snow got so bad so quick they hid from me. I am planning to make a path to try to lure them into the coop but that will take days I am not a teen anymore.

Thanks for your kind words it is so sad when we lose a pet, even a chicken. My Daisy was the most beautiful one, she was a Golden Lakenvelder, and really FAT. )

Happy New year!!

 

[Churkenduse]

TheOldChick, you are absolutely right, I do not think I could do it anyway. I will freeze her to give back to the animals, I hate the thought of that happening but that is the way of the animal world.

The thought of plucking her feathers is making me physically ill, so I know eating her is not an option. I just didn't want to toss her in a can.
It will be hard for me to lay her down for some animal to eat her seems hard also. She is basically in tact, he only got to her wing when I disturbed him.
He flew off, I can't just leave here in the same spot that would be like ringing the dinner bell for my remaining hens.

I appreciate all your suggestins I needed them to weigh the options.

 

[ky chicks]

So sorry for your loss, and I know exactly how you feel. We just lost our first chicken to a predator last week, and I had the same questions. A dog from down the road was chasing one of my hens, and my brave rooster jumped in and got himself killed, saving the hen in the process. I followed the trail of feathers into the woods, where I found Billy dead at the end, the dog already out of sight. At first I left him there for the wild animals, but I went back later and got him. I decided that it was still pretty close to our coop, and I didn't want any other critters getting a taste of chicken. And he died in defense of the hens, so my boys want to give him a respectful burial. Right now he's double-bagged in a freezer in the garage, but since it has warmed up in the past couple of days, I think we can bury him today. I'm not sure what I would have done if we didn't have an extra freezer.