Finding Neighbor’s dead chickens every day

[Sunshade82]

My neighbors had 30-40 chickens in a 3 sided coop inside a 4 ft fence. (The coop didn't have a door)Every time he forgot to water or feed them they'd fly over the fence and his dogs killed them.

A coop without a door, What’s the point? Ugh. My son’s in-laws were the same. “There’s no predators, it’s fine.” Their chickens are all gone now.

There have been some live chickens coming over into my mom’s yard. That’s actually how she got started on her chicken journey. One came to her yard every day to lay an egg and finally stayed. So she named her and got her friends. (We asked first if she could keep it.)
There is another chicken that has been visiting every day. Prudence. My mom is so worried that she’ll get picked off. I wish we could just train her not to go back over the wall in the evening.

 

[The Moonshiner]

Toss the carcasses over the wall. Throw them onto their porch. Box them and mail them to her.

 

[AinaWGSD]

Toss the carcasses over the wall. Throw them onto their porch. Box them and mail them to her.

Agreed, I would be returning the carcasses to their property and let them deal with the cleanup.

 

[Ginmary]

A coop without a door, What’s the point? Ugh. My son’s in-laws were the same. “There’s no predators, it’s fine.” Their chickens are all gone now.

There have been some live chickens coming over into my mom’s yard. That’s actually how she got started on her chicken journey. One came to her yard every day to lay an egg and finally stayed. So she named her and got her friends. (We asked first if she could keep it.)
There is another chicken that has been visiting every day. Prudence. My mom is so worried that she’ll get picked off. I wish we could just train her not to go back over the wall in the evening.

Integrate Prudence into your flock, they won't miss her.

 

[Penpal]

Get a copy of your township/city's ordinances. There should be ordinances regarding barking dogs, etc. See what it says about poultry, if anything. They may be breaking the law, in which case you can call the city office.

It is really up to your mom to do something about this. She can put traps out. If she traps any she can't just take the raccoon somewhere else. It will cause problems somewhere else, and may even make her way back to your neighborhood. You have to kill it/them.

You can use poison, but you have to ensure only the raccoons will get into it.

Raccoons hate the smell of peppermint. You can fill spray bottle with water and add a little peppermint, spray it around the perimeters. But, you will have to reapply after a rain. You have to keep doing it until they hibernate.

As to daytime predating: a raccoon will be out before dusk when the days are long. If they are out in the afternoon they are probably sick, most likely rabies. If you see one in the daytime call the police. They will come out and shoot it, or will trap it and take it out to a nice "farm", depending on how old your children are. My grandkids found one in my backyard after school and there was an immediate response.

 

[Sunshade82]

Toss the carcasses over the wall. Throw them onto their porch. Box them and mail them to her.

I told her to yeet it over the wall. She doesn’t want their kids to find it. I told her they’re probably finding some over there anyways.

 

[Sunshade82]

Get a copy of your township/city's ordinances. There should be ordinances regarding barking dogs, etc. See what it says about poultry, if anything. They may be breaking the law, in which case you can call the city office.

It is really up to your mom to do something about this. She can put traps out. If she traps any she can't just take the raccoon somewhere else. It will cause problems somewhere else, and may even make her way back to your neighborhood. You have to kill it/them.

You can use poison, but you have to ensure only the raccoons will get into it.

Raccoons hate the smell of peppermint. You can fill spray bottle with water and add a little peppermint, spray it around the perimeters. But, you will have to reapply after a rain. You have to keep doing it until they hibernate.

As to daytime predating: a raccoon will be out before dusk when the days are long. If they are out in the afternoon they are probably sick, most likely rabies. If you see one in the daytime call the police. They will come out and shoot it, or will trap it and take it out to a nice "farm", depending on how old your children are. My grandkids found one in my backyard after school and there was an immediate response.

I thought about quoting the City codes for them. Especially since he’s a police officer. There has to be something about it. Our city codes are hard to navigate.
The problem is my moms chicken math put her over the allowed amount of birds so I don’t want her to get in trouble.

 

[Finnie]

I wish we could just train her not to go back over the wall in the evening

You probably can. If your mom locks all her chickens plus Prudence up in the run and doesn’t let them free range for, oh about 2 weeks, Prudence will probably get used to her new home and then when they get to free range again, she will probably go to roost with her new flock instead of hopping the wall to her old flock.

The problem is my moms chicken math put her over the allowed amount of birds so I don’t want her to get in trouble.

In this case, it’s probably not a good idea to try to get authorities involved to make the neighbors comply with statutes. I don’t see any way to make the neighbors change anything. It sounds like the best you can do is make sure your chickens are secure at night so they stay safe. And resign yourselves to dealing with all the carcasses.

I imagine electric fence wouldn’t be allowed in your neighborhood? That might work better than barbed wire to keep the raccoons out.

 

[McChooky]

A coop without a door, What’s the point? Ugh. My son’s in-laws were the same. “There’s no predators, it’s fine.” Their chickens are all gone now.

There have been some live chickens coming over into my mom’s yard. That’s actually how she got started on her chicken journey. One came to her yard every day to lay an egg and finally stayed. So she named her and got her friends. (We asked first if she could keep it.)
There is another chicken that has been visiting every day. Prudence. My mom is so worried that she’ll get picked off. I wish we could just train her not to go back over the wall in the evening.

They didn't give a rat about the chickens but they had row after row of expensive galvanized nest boxes for them to lay in all on the back wall.The chickens roosted in the middle closer to the front.You might find a welfare group that'll get involved but I doubt it.

 

[Seaslug]

Can you set up a game cam so you know for certain what is killing the chickens and bringing them over to your property? Raccoons can be out during the day without being ill. A lot of predators are out in daylight that we think of as nocturnal. I would limit all free ranging while a predator is active.