Devastated

[Ren88]

Hi guys

Had the most awful day yesterday. I had a phone call whilst I was at work from my partner at about midday telling me he cant find one of the chickens (pekin Bantam).

All my hens are free range in the garden when we are at home, and up until now this has not proved to be a problem.

Whilst searching for her, her found a huge mass of feathers and her wing behind a bush in the garden. We are devastated to lose one of our flock. All the others were fine (2 hybrids and another pekin) and were un disturbed. #

We have a feeling it is a cat, what do you think????

I feel like ive let my girls down but i honestly thought they are safe in the garden during daylight as we have never ever seen any fox activity and whenever a cat has looked like it has been stalking the hens, the larger ladies have always squared up to them, so i wrongfully assumed the pekins would be safe as long as my hybrids were present.

Dont really feel comfortable letting them out into the rest of the garden now, Any ideas or tips would be really useful.

so so upset this has happened!

Renée

 

[scratch'n'peck]

So sorry about your loss. It could be a cat or perhaps a fox. I have heard of others who lost a chicken to a fox that came out during the day. We live in the forest so there are too many potential predators for our chickens to free range without some supervision. Our flock has a covered chicken run and we let them graze when we can watch them. I know some people who have dogs who are trained well enough to be around chickens, and they tend to keep predators at bay.

 

[highpointfarm]

sounds like a feline type, eaither a cat, or a fox, or a bobcat....