Dogs that kill weasels but not chickens?

[JaeG]

You would need a dog breed specifically bred for catching rodents and small animals. You'd have the best luck with a puppy and it would take a lot of training. With puppies especially it takes a long time and a lot of effort, but the results are worth it.

Puppies are puppy brained for quite some time and so you have to be patient and wait for their brains to mature before expecting them to be safe out with the flock unattended (ie. watching out for predators and pests rather than chasing a chickens because it got a fright and the excitement was too much for your pup to handle).

My next dog will be something I can use to catch rodents, but with all of our other animals it will need to live in harmony with I know I'll have to get a puppy and socialise and train it well.

 

[parvani]

Eulogy for Chick Fillet:

She was barely past being a pullet, a Faverolle hen only a year old. She was a very blond Faverolle -- a Marilyn Monroe bombshell rather than a Norma Jean redhead.

All the boys loved Chick Fillet. But sometimes in the evening, just before dusk, she'd go completely crazy. She'd squawk and holler while racing around the perimeter of the patio, around and through the dinnertime gathering of the other dozen chickens.

Around and around she'd run, squawking and shrieking as if a rapist rooster was after her. The roosters would just watch her, dumbfounded...

About the third or fourth circuit she'd make, eventually one of the fellows could resist the temptation no longer. He'd leap on her back and mount her against her continued objections.

And when he was done, Chick was fine again, quiet and normal, her madness past until the dusk the next evening.

She was the most entertaining chicken.

 

[bobbi-j]

Honestly, it doesn't sound like you have very determined predators in your area.

Maybe you could help me more with a solution if you actually had experience with the problem?

I do have experience with predators. I live in the country and our predators include: hawks, fox, coyote, mink, raccoons, skunks, weasels, great horned owls and bald eagles. My chickens free range during the day (and yes, I have lost chickens to each and every one of these predators at some point in my 35+ years of chicken keeping). I can tell you that I have not lost a free ranging chicken to a weasel during the day. That was my original point - that I would not be concerned about that. (If your chickens were roosting on the patio chairs or in any other unprotected area, your predator didn’t have to be very determined, either - the buffet was wide open.)

 

[bobbi-j]

"Free ranging" as in out and about doing chicken things? Or "free ranging" as in roosting unprotected in trees and such? I have never lost a chicken in the daytime while out hunting and pecking and scratching about. I did, however, lose one to a mink in the run in the middle of the day just a couple of months ago.

I can see where you thought I don’t have experience with weasels. My fingers didn’t keep up with my thoughts. What I meant to say was, “I have never lost a chicken to a weasel or mink in the daytime while out...”

 

[Howard E]

Free ranging as in, they had the run of my fully-fenced, 1/3 acre urban property, with all the delights that implies. At night they preferred to roost on my metal patio table or chairs, although they were also roosting with the goats under the laurel trees.

If you have chickens roosting on patio furniture or under trees with goats, it's a miracle they lasted one night.

 

[cmom]

I would try to trap the weasels.
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=weasel+traps&atb=v250-1&iax=images&ia=images

 

[cmom]

Last summer my little backyard flock was attacked by a weasel. I know it was a weasel because I went out in the middle of the attack and it vanished, after killing chickens that were inside a large kennel cage (for protection from the "raccoon" I thought had attacked them the night before.)

Weasels are the only predator small enough to slip between bars and vanish in the night, unseen.

Now I'm terrified to let my chickens forage out of their coop even during the day, because weasels are not strictly nocturnal.

Is there a dog, like maybe a rat terrier, that would hunt weasels but NOT kill my chickens?

Free ranging as in, they had the run of my fully-fenced, 1/3 acre urban property, with all the delights that implies. At night they preferred to roost on my metal patio table or chairs, although they were also roosting with the goats under the laurel trees.

If you have chickens roosting on patio furniture or under trees with goats, it's a miracle they lasted one night.

I agree. I'm surprised also your birds have lasted this long. If you let them hang out like you did you are going to loose birds and now the weasels know where they can get an easy chicken dinner. Good luck...

 

[centrarchid]

Last summer my little backyard flock was attacked by a weasel. I know it was a weasel because I went out in the middle of the attack and it vanished, after killing chickens that were inside a large kennel cage (for protection from the "raccoon" I thought had attacked them the night before.)

Weasels are the only predator small enough to slip between bars and vanish in the night, unseen.

Now I'm terrified to let my chickens forage out of their coop even during the day, because weasels are not strictly nocturnal.

Is there a dog, like maybe a rat terrier, that would hunt weasels but NOT kill my chickens?

Likely, most dogs can be used to kill the weasel. My German Pointers and English Shepherds used as poultry guardians make short work of weasels and mink. The weasels and mink do not appear good at avoiding the dogs. There are some challenges with the arrangement. The dogs need to be able to get at the predator without damaging pens. My dogs will destroy a pen in short order to get at a baby skunk creating more damage than the predator could do.

If dog not good around poultry, then you need to be present when weasel present to ensure dog stays on mission. My experience with nasty little critters is they do not come when it suits you.

I like dogs around chickens and can do things most people cannot free-range because of the services the dogs provide. That said, having dog a dog for dealing with a single predator issue is not a good approach. Short-term I would be getting so birds are up and off ground or moved away from low area / rodent infestation the weasel following.

 

[parvani]

Likely, most dogs can be used to kill the weasel. My German Pointers and English Shepherds used as poultry guardians make short work of weasels and mink. The weasels and mink do not appear good at avoiding the dogs. There are some challenges with the arrangement. The dogs need to be able to get at the predator without damaging pens. My dogs will destroy a pen in short order to get at a baby skunk creating more damage than the predator could do.

Thank you for an on-topic response that doesn't make a lot of hyper-critical assumptions. (Seriously, what is with all these posters ganging up to attack newbies? Do I smell bad, or what?)

German pointers and English shepherds? Check. I'll research both breeds

If dog not good around poultry, then you need to be present when weasel present to ensure dog stays on mission. My experience with nasty little critters is they do not come when it suits you.

I like dogs around chickens and can do things most people cannot free-range because of the services the dogs provide. That said, having dog a dog for dealing with a single predator issue is not a good approach. Short-term I would be getting so birds are up and off ground or moved away from low area / rodent infestation the weasel following.

I have 4 and a half cats, two goats, and now dozens of chickens plus outlaw roosters inside city limits. What's another animal more or less?

This is a major metropolitan area with apartment buildings everywhere. There are plenty of rats to keep the weasels fed. I knew about the rats, raccoons, and opossums... And the occasional coyote is still sighted, but my yard is fenced and my dwarf goats have never been attacked.

Weasels were nowhere on my radar. It had never occurred to me that they might live in the city.

I'm a newbie to chickens. I've had them less than a year, but they've kept me from going crazy in lockdown. Most of the ones I have now were handraised from eggs, and I love them.

My coops and runs have hardware cloth rather than chicken wire because I needed to keep rats out. I knew that from the start. But I'm now afraid to let my chickens forage for bugs outside of their coops. There's a garden and a meadow where they used to enjoy pecking at the dirt and digging for goodies all day long... But the weasel attack was so horrific that I don't want to risk letting them loose without a guardian standing by.

I am very good at training animals and birds. Even the goats obey me, more or less, most of the time. (And goats are wicked stubborn!) I've trained the cats to ignore the chickens and the baby chicks. I'm pretty sure if I find the right breed of dog that I can train them to protect the birds.

I just really need suggestions for breeds that can be trained to protect chickens.

 

[Geena]

The simple answer is most any dog, purebred or mixed, that has good prey drive will take care of whatever unwanted critters you have. It's the training a high prey drive dog that your chickens, cats and goats are off limits that will be the hard part.
There really is no certain breed of dog that is best for this sort of task. It's more about the individual dog, the owner's set-up and circumstances and their ability to train said dog.