- May 8, 2012
- 49
- 0
- 34
After considerable combing of the internet using various keywords, I have come up emptyhanded.
I began raising chickens for the first time with the cool weather of March in Texas (those two days- yeah). When things heated up, I came out to find two dead baby chicks wet from the throat down. Remembering my happy barefooted walks down the garden path I shudder now that my daily prerecorded message to my child is, "Don't you dare go outside in flip flops!". The night we returned home from the movies to find one chick dead and a 4 foot (not hyperbole) rat snake coiled in the coop was the final proverbial straw.
I already trapped a baby snake in the garage and killed two and I had my fill of it then and there.
I told my boyfriend I wanted it to be Ireland around that coop. We watched my little black chick peck around in his stress and knew we had to protect them with more than a shovel to the snake after the fact. I've never been so rattled (no pun intended).
Three serpent events later and minus six chicks and two guineas, I decided to take action that weekend. We hired help and cleared the area surrounding the coop for a quarter acre on every side, killing six snakes in the process:::shudder:::. We dug a pen inside a pen down into the coop but it still doesn't feel safe.
I got to thinking and scoured the internet again. How can there be so many people with snake problems and no clear solution? It must be either a conspiracy or a shameful lack of proaction. There HAS to be something to kill these vermin before they murder my flock. They have some weakness, some point at which I can either deter or kill them. I'm good either way. My love for all God's creatures extends only so far as they leave me and mine alone. When you make me pick up a shotgun or a shovel, we're at war. Geneva Conventions do not apply to snakes- end of story.
I tried sticky traps. Sadly, I actually caught two baby guineas trying to escape and my boyfriend joked I caught more poultry than snakes using the sticky traps. We spent an hour with oil freeing the little guineas and reviving them and I ust pictured little chalk outlines of chicks around the coop.
I used Dr. T's- let me tell you- that might as well as have been made from ground up baby chicks the way it brought the snakes over the next few days- and yes, I left an opening, etc. Following instructions is my strong suit.
I tried Animal repellent, sulphur, lime, liquid seaweed, planted ROWS of rosemary and put up hardware cloth. I had to dogs pee around the coop and racked my brain to think of more. Where they can get in is a mystery. The rat snake actually climbed UP a metal wall when my boyfriend bisected its body with a shovel that should have been much sharper than it was.
My next brilliant idea is to wrap the edges of my coop in barbed wire, seal that with mesh, cover that with hardware cloth and create a barrier of rat glue traps nailed to 2x4 tamped into the ground. I also bought a spectacular Anthro hook from which to hang my shovel. But there has to be a better answer.
These creatures crawl, they have exposed bellies and they have weaknesses. I'm thinking something severely caustic perhaps mixed with an abrasive substance mixed with something that snakes react to the way we react to jalepeno juice in the eyes, rolled into finely ground glass. But surely there's a better way?
I began raising chickens for the first time with the cool weather of March in Texas (those two days- yeah). When things heated up, I came out to find two dead baby chicks wet from the throat down. Remembering my happy barefooted walks down the garden path I shudder now that my daily prerecorded message to my child is, "Don't you dare go outside in flip flops!". The night we returned home from the movies to find one chick dead and a 4 foot (not hyperbole) rat snake coiled in the coop was the final proverbial straw.
I already trapped a baby snake in the garage and killed two and I had my fill of it then and there.
I told my boyfriend I wanted it to be Ireland around that coop. We watched my little black chick peck around in his stress and knew we had to protect them with more than a shovel to the snake after the fact. I've never been so rattled (no pun intended).
Three serpent events later and minus six chicks and two guineas, I decided to take action that weekend. We hired help and cleared the area surrounding the coop for a quarter acre on every side, killing six snakes in the process:::shudder:::. We dug a pen inside a pen down into the coop but it still doesn't feel safe.
I got to thinking and scoured the internet again. How can there be so many people with snake problems and no clear solution? It must be either a conspiracy or a shameful lack of proaction. There HAS to be something to kill these vermin before they murder my flock. They have some weakness, some point at which I can either deter or kill them. I'm good either way. My love for all God's creatures extends only so far as they leave me and mine alone. When you make me pick up a shotgun or a shovel, we're at war. Geneva Conventions do not apply to snakes- end of story.
I tried sticky traps. Sadly, I actually caught two baby guineas trying to escape and my boyfriend joked I caught more poultry than snakes using the sticky traps. We spent an hour with oil freeing the little guineas and reviving them and I ust pictured little chalk outlines of chicks around the coop.
I used Dr. T's- let me tell you- that might as well as have been made from ground up baby chicks the way it brought the snakes over the next few days- and yes, I left an opening, etc. Following instructions is my strong suit.
I tried Animal repellent, sulphur, lime, liquid seaweed, planted ROWS of rosemary and put up hardware cloth. I had to dogs pee around the coop and racked my brain to think of more. Where they can get in is a mystery. The rat snake actually climbed UP a metal wall when my boyfriend bisected its body with a shovel that should have been much sharper than it was.
My next brilliant idea is to wrap the edges of my coop in barbed wire, seal that with mesh, cover that with hardware cloth and create a barrier of rat glue traps nailed to 2x4 tamped into the ground. I also bought a spectacular Anthro hook from which to hang my shovel. But there has to be a better answer.
These creatures crawl, they have exposed bellies and they have weaknesses. I'm thinking something severely caustic perhaps mixed with an abrasive substance mixed with something that snakes react to the way we react to jalepeno juice in the eyes, rolled into finely ground glass. But surely there's a better way?
