So sorry @Saris . That really stinks. It makes me mad to hear about predators that kill a bunch of livestock only to leave uneaten bodies.
I get that they have to eat and that's why they come around but why are they just killing. I hope you get the little bugger (want to use a different term but it's not appropriate). Hope the rest of the flock is doing okay.
Yep. My older daughter ("you aren't going to kill anything") figures the wild animals need to eat. Apparently even if it is one of her favorite chickens. If the coon that ate only Fae's head and neck was hungry, it would have eaten the rest of her. When it returned to the barn at 7:15 that evening (going I presume for the hen recovering from an infection in the broody box!), I trapped it in the coop. Shot, tossed in the woods for the buzzards, and
I shut up.
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We'd most likely end up drowning it. Not my preferred method, but if we can get it trapped I sure as heck am not going to try and get a full grown live raccoon out of a trap to dispatch it. I can fill a big rubber tub with water and drop it in with rocks on top. Or maybe bring it out to the woods and shoot it in the cage. Depending on time of day and what not. I am not practiced with a gun or a bow to really want to shoot at it unless it's up close, I wouldn't want to miss.
I can get behind the shovel and shut up part though. hahah
REALLY sorry for the trauma you and your birds suffered.
I agree, I do not have the skills to shoot an animal "on the run", or even "on the sit". But they are really hard to miss in a Havahart trap.
Air pellet guns are not considered "firearms" in many cities, especially in the .117 size. Yet they can carry a pellet a good distance so I am a bit surprised they are NOT considered firearms. I bought a Gamo "Bone Collector" air rifle the day the coon killed Fae. Still in the plastic bag in the box when I trapped the coon in the coop. Took 3 shots but without any iron sights and having no idea how straight it was shooting, even at 10 feet or less, it was hard to know where I hit it. The coon moved between each shot (single shot, the pellets were 30' away on a table). On the other hand, the adult chuck that I trapped in the havahart in the barn alley died fast and I would guess painlessly. Inches from the barrel of the gun and through the forehead. No more woodchuck tunnels opened into the alley floor since.
If you find you CAN use air pellet guns in the city, use heavy pellets. There are reviews that say the Bone Collector is as loud as a .22 rim fire. But those people are using lightweight pellets that break the sound barrier. I bought the Gamo Whisper pellets, 10.5 grain. When I later mounted the scope and started to learn the gun, the smack when the pellet buried into the 3/4" particle board backstop 40' away was louder than the gun. I suspect you could fire that outside someone's bedroom window and they wouldn't hear it.
It's not against the law where we live and I guess we just live far enough out in the country that if animal control takes them they don't come back. They also don't become someone else's problem because there are no people. I'm thinking you must live in a neighborhood or near a city? Just a guess because we don't have those problems here... I'm not trying to be rude so I hope I don't seem that way. It's just not how you described where I live. Lots of livestock here also.
Do they tell people they "rehome" the vermin ALIVE? I'm willing to bet even if they say it, they don't do it. It is illegal ANYWHERE in Vermont to "rehome" a coon and we have a lot of unpopulated land.
If you live trap it, why not take it way out of town in a more natural habitat and release it? Your halfway there anyway.
Because relocating is illegal in a lot of places.
hopefully you catch the critter so it doesn't come back..
