Attacked by Racoon, Severe Injuries, Emergency, Plz Help

[Leighe]

I've had all blind chickens and partially blind chickens, for my all blind chickens,they were the sweetest chickens I've ever had, they'd sit on my feet or lap and softly coo, I miss them so much. Feeding them was hard though, they knew the sound of food when I'd shake it so theyd start to peck at the ground to eat when nothing was there so I'd have to slip the food under there pecks and eventually they'd get the hang of it and ate, I had to separate them from other chickens because they weren't functional with other chickens. One night I had shut them in there dog crate and raccoons opened it and ate them, I was more sad when they died than any other chicken because they were so sweet. As for my partially blind chicken named Oreo she does fine with everyone else, she knows how to eat and where to eat and how to get in the coop and such, the only thing different is she's just more cautious and jumpy and easily scared, but thats it she does fine overall. She went blind in one of her eyes when she was a chick and got pecked in they eye bad.

Dagnabit! Tear runnin down my face.......

 

[centrarchid]

@OG Anomaly

Could you post a current picture of her eyes open?

 

[OG Anomaly]

@OG Anomaly

Could you post a current picture of her eyes open?

I will try, but she doesn't keep it open all the time, I've been trying, lol. I'll try harder.

 

[OG Anomaly]

WE GOT THE RACOON!
He came back this morning!!
I went & checked them about 5:30a and they were fine.
I was just going to lay down, when I heard Squawker.
We have one who is a real loudmouth, over what? I don't know!, but I keep going to check on her & she's fine! Because of that, when I first heard her squawk, I wasn't too concerned and thought she was 'crying wolf'! But, she wasn't taking a breath and it sounded different, so I went to go check.
At the same time my son also heard her and he could see the beast from his upstairs window!
He's yelling down the stairs to me, I'm trying to get the door open, birds are screaming, it was a little crazy- I can still feel the adrenaline!
Anyway, the guy with the traps hadn't gotten back to us yet and we had to shoot it.
So...he's gone and hopefully things will calm down a little bit.
My son hadn't secured the hardware cloth well enough (I Told him he had to, smh) and it got in thru the vent space and into the coop! He didn't get anybody this time tho & no one is hurt, and we lucked out again! (I should go buy a lottery ticket today!)
He will be fixing that hardware cloth, properly, today!

 

[centrarchid]

Calm down. You got a raccoon. Keep traps out. It is very possible it moves about with others at night. What sex is it?

 

[Top Rooster]

Very possible they sometimes go in groups of 3 or 4.

 

[centrarchid]

My last round had four confirmed plus at least one more that I could not catch. It was the latter that took a couple ground roosting birds in one night. Very unlikely one raccoon will take two adult chickens that were likely 50 feet apart when encountered. Traps where set but hotwire shut raccoons access down.

 

[OG Anomaly]

Calm down. You got a raccoon. Keep traps out. It is very possible it moves about with others at night. What sex is it?

Calm down. You got a raccoon. Keep traps out. It is very possible it moves about with others at night. What sex is it?

Haha, ok, I'm calm
It was a male, and that's what I said! -->That we still need to get the traps and keep our ears open.
I'm sure there's more, we've heard them fighting amongst themselves.

 

[centrarchid]

Some of the "fighting" sounds are contact calls. It helps keep group together even when they cannot see or smell each other. They do scrap a little. I think you will see yearling males running with sisters, even if sister has kittens.

 

[centrarchid]

I have one rooster with impaired vision. He is 8 years old and has been that way since about two years of age. He was damaged by a large dog that chewed through very heavy fencing to get at him. Like your hen, attack caused extensive damage to head, plus rooster lost most wing and tail feathers. He is not one I can let run free-range without supervision as he is easy to sneak up on from the side. Genetically a good bird.