Fox Fox Fox Fox!!!!

[10chicks]

I'm sure this is on here somewhere but I can't find. Does anyone know how the fox kill? I had 12 hens and 1 rooster. One snowy night they got ahold of six hens and the rooster. We must have came home during the kill because we found one hen bitten in the back of the neck but still alive in the snow. We also found four more dead -one with a head missing! We found the prints and I'm sure they're fox but I wasn't sure if fox got the back of the neck and how many they will take at a time. A day later my rooster came walking across the front of the house heading for the coop! haha (Glad he protected those hens-He ran at the first sign of trouble!!) And the bitten hen survived It's snowy here and the tracks are back so today is hunting day!!!

 

[Kennyog]

A fox will bite the neck to break it.They will bite the back also crushing the spine.Most of the time they carry the kill off and you never see it again.Another thing,a fox will come back at anytime of the day or night.I have seen fox around my coop at 2:00pm before.If i were going to ambush one,i would do it as close to dark as i could.

 

[gsim]

Is your flock free-range or confined?

Foxes are the very devil to trap. Leg traps are about only the hope for trapping success, as live traps mostly fail. A stakeout is a thing of misery in this cold weather. Would use the dead chooks for bait too whether stakeout or trap. If trapping, spread some chook poop around to drown out human scent. Temporary relief can be had by 'marking' with your urine around your coop area yourself. (Be sure to wave at the neighbors if they spot you so they do not get the wrong idea!)

Ultimately, an electrified run and a locked coop at dusk is the real deal concerning flock security from ground preds.