Dragon was Killed EDIT: Pip Killed

[bdfive]

I too lost 2 hand raised peafowl that were pets chased out of the trees in 2 nights, run down and killed. I still don't know what did it but could have been Great Horned Owls. I was devastated and cried for days.....still break down at times. I penned my remaining free range birds for a while and have dispatched 5 raccoons, a possum and a skunk. I know the skunk got 3 eggs during hatching. I put the other 4 in an incubator which finished the process in a couple hours. All has gone so well the past 3 years I've had my birds but this year has been a nightmare. Let me say again how sorry I am you lost your beloved peas....I know how much it hurts. I still think I can go out and feed my beautiful Douglas and Sweet Pea from my hand but they aren't here anymore. I won't tolerate predators anymore.....they best find someplace else to eat.

 

[Mrs. Fluffy Puffy]

Minxfox - I read the whole thread and let me just say I just about cryed my eyes out!

I know you must be feeling just AWFUL right now!

I hope you catch them darn coons!

~ Aspen

 

[clinton9]

Hi Minx,
I sincerely apologise for gave you wrong advise about buy normal peafowls and not pied / white peafowls, as I were told by members of BackYardChicken.com I were not correct about white / pied birds targeted by predators and members of BackYardChicken.com told me normal, pied, white birds can be targeted randomly by predators, usually by chance.
I am not being mean to you.

I am trying to help you slove the problem of keep peafowls stay alive and slove the predator problem.

You have wonderful lovely pied peafowls Dragon & Pip, but I am very sorry you lost Dragon & Pip.

I am very SORRY.

Clinton.

 

[6littlechickies]

Clinton9

I think that the point is being missed. Pied, SP, and white birds do exist and many people prefer to keep them. In the wild they may be selected against more often, but these were penned birds, that were fine for quite a while before predator attacks. I have had fowl taken before and not just white ones. I don't think people should be discouraged from getting different patterns, attacks happen to all fowl, free range or penned. If penned we just need to make sure they are secure and if are breached then we take corrective action to prevent further attacks. Sometimes this can't be done overnight and thats the tough part. Minx takes incredible care of her birds and frankly I think the same would have happened with regular pattern birds. To hypothesize otherwise is fruitless now.

 

[clinton9]

Hi 6Littlechickies,
I agree with you, but I means Mother Nature. Chance of both normal coloured birds and white birds being attacked by predators, are ransom, etc a raccoon take a normal-coloured peafowl instead of white peafowl, this is because predator choose the bird being nearest to predator.

I feel very sorry and sad for Minx as she took excellant care of her peafowls and had a sound big good peafowl pen until raccoons came & got Dragon & Pip.

Peafowls are intelligent birds and they learn not be caught by predators, so 2 white birds out of 10 white birds, stay alive to reproduce more white birds.
Have watching the other birds being caught and killed by predators, teach the birds that are alive and watching, not be caught by predators.

Raccoons are intelligent mammals and are social animals, with 4 males lives in their homes, while female raccoons lives with daughters and baby raccoons. A Mother raccoon have 5 babies per year, and when young male raccoons leave their parental homes, they walk very long distances and makes themselves pests by enter people's properties, to eat people"s birds and small animals, fruits, nuts & few plants. Raccoons start breed at @ 8-12 months old.
I think raccoons in Minx's land, are both males and male raccoons are much bigger and are more willing to attack animals & birds than smaller female raccoons.
Minx's land may have between 2 and 4 raccoons. Winter is months when raccoons often make themselves pests by come to eat people's birds & animals, as well as cats and small dogs and eating rubbish from rubbish bins, often have skunks to join them. Numbers of raccoons are at highest on July to Sept, when juveniles outnumber adults.

Only sure way is to get raccoon control persons to remove raccoons out of member"s lands, but if no raccoon control people are available, only option is to set 10 traps to catch 4 raccoons in Minx's land, because being such clever animal, the raccoon avoid the trap, only to walk to other trap & get trapped.
More camouflaged the traps, and have bait being hold by a string to trap, and traps are not rusted and been tested, more likely raccoons get caught.
I think Minx's dad did not tested the traps to see how they works or traps had rusted or Minx's dad did not camouflaged the traps, so raccoons avoided the uncamouflaged traps or Minx's dad did not tied the bait with string before setted the trap, that's why at Minx's land, the raccoon walked onto trap and did not got caught, then walked away.

Beware if raccoon get caught in a trap, it will yell to warn other raccoons to watch out for traps, so best is to sit out in darkness (wear your black or dark-coloured clothes) and wait until you see a raccoon get caught in trap...run run toward it & kill the raccoon with axe or metal bar or shoot with a shotgun.
Owning a gun, means you can remove raccoons yourself.

But raccoons will come back again, dead raccoons are replaced by young male raccoons take over people"s proberties.
June to Sept are months when there are lots of young male raccoons roaming everywhere looking for new homes.

A sound raccoon trap means no rust, been tested to see how it work, use the long dowel or stick, and it must work fast to catch a raccoon.
Rust cause trap to work too slow or not working.

4 traps are better than one trap, because a raccoon see a trap and walk away to avoid the half-camouflaged trap, only to walk into camouflaged traps, so no wonder Minx's dad putted one uncamouflaged trap instead of 4 traps, and caught nothing. So time Minx's dad need to buy more traps.

I hope Minx's dad catch the raccoons.

You are very welcome.

Clinton.





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[bdfive]

I've been told predators like raccoons don't see color therefore the white or pied are at no more danger then the darker birds. Haven't researched it so don't know if that's true. Our trap is rusty and I've caught 5 or 6 raccoons, a possum and a skunk since my 2 peas were killed a short while back. I do put some logs around it and a board across the top with big rock on it to keep it from being shifted with critter crawling around on top or trying to reach in the sides. I've not be able to catch a fox but read a lot of preperation needs to be done to fool them.

 

[clinton9]

Hi bdfive,
How about 4 traps per raccoon ?...say if raccoon see the trap, it only to walk to other traps. One trap won't work with brainy predators as raccoons and foxes, unless trap have to be camouflaged and have to work fast to catch the animals. this means bury the trap in sand or soil, and bait is to be tied to trap, so if animal tagging it, it get caught.

Raccoons, skunks, opossum, foxes, bobcats cannot see colour during nightime and not likely to see the camouflaged traps.

If you set traps for foxes & raccoons, you have to set the 6 traps at 40c.m space between traps...like this

# # #
# # #

Chance the animals will not know there are more than one trap, and animals cannot count, say a male raccoon get a fright when trap set, but missed, so Raccoon think "Ah this one trap missed me...now I'm safe" and walk into other trap & get caught.

Most animals only know one trap and do not know about 4 or 6 traps.

Minx had seen two raccoons near her peafowl pen.

Clinton



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[Frosty]

I only have one trap and set it so that it's surrounded by vegetation (corn stalks, high weeds, etc...) When I first got the trap (after a turkey hen was attacked), we caught two young raccoons the first night (both apparently went in together). We shot them, didn't even wash out the trap before we put it back where it was. Over the next few days we caught a few more youngsters, then we got two bigger ones. The largest was 25 pounds. They seemed to have been the parents. Then we didn't have any more problems. I used an ear of corn for bait. I tried using eggs but kept catching one of my cats.

I had some turkeys running loose one year, a Palm cross hen with her poults. The mom and one poult were mostly white, the rest were bronze. They were hanging out with a wild turkey hen and her poults, all roosted in the same tree at night. Winter was setting in and a great horned owl decided it wanted turkey for dinner. It was picking off the wild turkeys, not mine. When I figured out what was going on I locked mine up.

 

[bdfive]

I've been meaning to get another trap but having that many would be a lot of work to set every night, not to mention the cost. We purchase the good heavy ones and coons still bend them up trying to get out after caught. Are you talking about live traps? Maybe it would be best to use some other kind of trap. We're very near a year round creek so will always have predators where there is a water supply for them. Sure would help if folks didn't think they were cute and feed them like my 2 neighbors do and who knows how many others.

YES, saw the pictures of the 2 raccoons taken by Minx. Think I mentioned using a baby monitor to hear whats going on outside. Am hearing something either in the metal wire trap or trying to get into the 1" by 2" welded wire pens. I intend to get a night game camera soon. Husband is going out of town for the next few days so I may have to deal with any caught bird killers myself. I don't intend to let down my guard. I have 14 peachicks out there from about 2 weeks to going on 3 months. Even tho they can't get into the pens they could reach through the welded wire in a few places. Chicks are roosted nights but with the draught we're having predators are being seen during the day hunting for food. Hang on....I have to go see what that noise is.......................nothing in the trap and the sound stopped when I went outside.



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[bdfive]

Sorry, have to laugh at you catching the cat. For a while I was constantly trapping my neighbors cats. She's down to 1 now and keeps it inside. I guess predators got the others. I've used dry corn but fresh corn sounds like a good idea. I've been baiting with dry cat food and some stinky canned fish.

I read something about predators perhaps being drawn to the darker birds rather then white. Wish I'd kept that article. If I remember right they gave a good reason for it. I'm scared to death to turn my younger peafowl back to free ranging. I don't hear the owls hooting and did release the older peahens about a week ago. All seems peaceful. Do great horned owls move on after making a couple kills or do they pretty much stay in their selected territory?




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