almost lost a 2 year old Edward hen on chrismas Ev..

[wilds of pa]

Dang squirrels chewed a hole in the netting that i didn't see. Went to let the dogs out and glanced over at the pens while opening the door.

there she was up on top of the kennel runs..

Well from passed mistakes i did not go after her till it got dark out. she roosted low thank goodness.

snuck up on here with a 15ft extension net. got her on the first try as she flew right into the net..

Now the war on those pesky little gray tree rats (squirrels) will commence.

 

[Tony K T]

I thought that poultry netting was great too,until the squirrels and chipmunks showed up.Now it's hardware cloth everywhere.The only problem now,is the chipmunks that tunnel in.Even though I have an apron around the perimeter they still get in.At least it's only chipmunks,nothing else can get in,but I do need to get rid of them little buggers.Lead works great.
Congrats on the catch.I'm sure you know from experience,you usually only get one shot at catching them.
In N.H.,Tony.

 

[wilds of pa]

Yup herd that, "only one shot" ... about 4 years ago i had a male Edward get away on me never to be seen again..was bummed for awhile about that one..was a daytime try to catch deal..

the tree rats chew on the edges were the netting touches the piping. so now I'm using 2"X3" fence to edge all around the piping on the top of the kennels, that should end the chewing along the piping, was gonna go with hardware cloth covering the whole top, but I'm afraid if they'd spook for some reason they may bust there heads open hitting it.

No problems with much smaller ground critters here with the electric rat traps around...

 

[flyingmonkeypoop]

The only squirrel we have in the area is a 'pet' that we raised from a pinkie. We originally had 3, Peanut was the first then we got Dan and Anne. Dan got fixed and one day on vacation their cage was left open, never saw Dan or Anne again but Peanut has stayed around. She is the size of a small rabbit now and calmer than a domestic rat. My netting got mostly ruined when the neighbors burned too close to the back of my old pens (no birds in them at the time) so the nylon netting melted. I was able to save about half of it but didnt get around to fixing the pens this fall. Where I am going with this is the squirrel cage is in our shed row of pens, its a 10 x 10 pen with 1" wire around the inside of it and 2x4 welded wire on the outside. We ran into some problems with the welded wire and both my cock pheasants I had at the time got loose. The melanistic ringneck couldnt fly due to a previous wing issue and the amherst lingered and roosted with the chickens that night. For now they are living in the squirrel cage and they get along great for now til spring when the rest of the pheasant pens get fixed.

Too bad about the netting but glad you were able to catch her, loosing any pheasant is never fun and loosing a hen is even worse.

 

[wilds of pa]

COOL ON THE PINKYS...Done that myself many years ago.. save and release is what we did, even with other critters, wild rabbits and even song birds when the unfortunate came up.. with all the feral cats around to theres always gonna be lots of orphaned baby rabbits around... but i do keep the cat population under control here. bang bang..

ya i know, you think after dealing with squirrels for that past years id learn, but well I'm on the ball now. repair repair, trap trap..

 

[philter4]

That is great that you got her back into her pen, I use welded horse wire because I have foxes and mountain lions on the property, squirrels don't even try to chew through my wire. Earlier this year I got 2 new pairs of F1 grey jungle fowl. When I get a new bird I always quarantine it for at least 2 weeks then move them to the barn. My barn has several heated pens that open up into outdoor flight pens but I don't let the birds outside until they are settled and know where the sleeping perches are because I can't leave them out at night. In the group was an older hen, she is 3 years old, the other is under a year, well on the 6th day I let both pairs out into their flight pens. I had made the second flight pen just for these birds because I was set up for only 1 more pair, within a minute or two of getting outside the hen found a corner where I had not attached the wire and flew right out and away! I was very upset to say the least.

That day the rooster called and crowed, I could hear the hen respond every once in a while until about 3 in the afternoon, after that nothing. I figured she just left the area. The next day I heard her down in the lower field, I live on several acres of oak scrub in the foothills near Lake Tahoe, and I went down following the sound. Just about every time the rooster called she answered so it was pretty easy to find her. Here she is in an oak tree the day after she escaped.

All of my life I have been able to catch birds, as a young child I used to bring blackbirds, grackels, quail and even humming birds home and try to talk my parents into keeping them (without success). As an adult I used this skill and worked collecting animals for different zoos and both private and public collections for many years which allowed me to travel all over the world. Well, the skill came into use again as a week to the day she escaped I caught her and returned her to the pen. She didn't want to leave the rooster so all of the days in between her escape and recapture she was close enough for me to find her if I had the time to listen and look. I was lucky, she was obviously hungry because she would fly in and steal the chicken scratch so I just hid with a butterfly net and sat quietly near the feed and when she was occupied with the food got her on the first try, it was just like when I was a kid.