About scaring them off, the long story is... over the past few years, I have seen some evidence that a bear was poking around the coop. Last year, I moved the coop a little further from the house. It is the same basic design the previous owners had for 15 years. This past Nov. around 3am with a full moon, a sow and two cubs pulled at the fencing for a bit and then figured out they could break down the door. I heard them grunting and ran outside (with a gun). I found one cub near the coop and the mom and the other cub 10 yards behind the coop eating chickens. There were a few chickens still alive in and out of the coop. I tried to use my voice to get the cub (near me and the coop) back to its mom. But it panicked, ran right past me and up a pine tree behind me. Now I was between it and the mom. I backed out slowly. About then my wife yells out "what's going on?" That caused the cub to climb about 30' up the tree and scream at the top of its lungs. The mom kept up a low grunt this whole time. We backed off to the deck to wait it out. The mom left the other cub, went into the woods and started to knock down branches and brush. Now both cubs were screaming and my horses and goats were getting upset. Finally the cub climbs down the tree and heads to the mom. They meet up and head back to the other cub behind the coop. Once they were all together, we made our move. I didn't want to shoot because I didn't want them to climb another tree. We moved in closer until the mom started to grunt. With our voices and presence, we made her uncomfortable enough that she started to back off. (I did have the rifle with me the whole time.) We finally got them back over the fence and it took 1 1/2 hours start to finish. We rounded up the remaining chickens and locked them in a bathroom. The next day I built a new door, the one you see in the pictures. In the picture it doesn't seem strong, but it was quite solid with the metal sliding bolts. The problem was that the bolts were too near the middle and she got leverage from the bottom.
About the scat, usually I find it more berry like. This time it is full of apples. They did help themselves to a bunch of my apples and a few plums, breaking a few branches in the process.
I rebuilt the door today with 4x4s and 6" lag screws. It is really heavy and going to be a bit harder to break. I added more bells to it so I hope to hear it this time.
We don't lock the dogs outside because they get sprayed by skunks every time we do that. Washing them in tomato juice gets old real quick. Also, there are so many animals out at night, the dogs will just bark all night long if they are out.
We moved here because we love outdoors and the wildlife. In four years, we have lost 20 chickens and 3 cats to just about every type of predator around. I do not want to kill the wildlife. I have shot a coyote that went after cats and chickens in the middle of the day. I never want to do that again. Now, I try to fire warning shots to scare off the predators. I added a lot more fencing around the house, so I am not losing cats and chickens during the day. (The cats now come in at night.) My only problem is stopping this bear from breaking down the door. Nothing has gotten in through the horse fencing wrapped around the coop and I have seen many attempts. Only the outer layer of chicken wire has been ripped off.
I think a motion type alarm with a sound like a smoke detector would be the best thing for me. I need it to go off when the door is shook, not when something walks by. I will google for that tomorrow. It took me all day to rebuild the door.
Btw, today the hardware store told me that another customer came in yesterday with the same problem. That bear has a taste for chicken.
It is good that someone has shown the photos of the damage a bear can do to a coop. I hope that no one is foolish enough to think they can run out and scare a bear off. If that bear thinks you are a damage to it's cub or itself you will look like the door. Any animal that can tear the door off a car needs to be given its space and a lot of it. What no one needs to do is should photos of a dead animal. Yes, it makes you feel good that this predator can no longer harm your chickens. But that predator was doing what it needed to do to live. Now a photo of a live predator is different.
