covfefe_crusade
Hatching
- Jan 31, 2020
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Hello Chicken Forum Users,
I've been a long time lurker, and this is my first post here, looking for some forensic expertise and advice.
This morning I woke up to tragedy in the chicken run; which is a large fenced pen with no roof. Inside of the run is a medium sized coop, which itself has raised nesting boxes, latching doors, and a small fenced and roofed run. The birds routinely jump the fence (6 feet tall) and explore outside of the pen, but always stay within a reasonable distance of it.
Lately I got complacent with leaving the coop door open at night, because I saw the birds playing outside past dark and didn't want to ruin their fun, although it looks like some creature did that for me. When I went to visit them this morning, I immediately noticed feathers all over the place. One of my white hens (maybe Wyandotte?) was missing entirely, and my oldest roo, I believe a sussex who was very docile, was dead, surrounded in his feathers- on the opposite side of the pen from the coop. Very NSFW- I uploaded the photos behind this link for those willing to see the tragedy. His entire neck from collar to head was picked to the his spine, and there is no damage to his head or body. I am wondering what kind of critter would do this, and how I can best prevent a similar attack from occuring. My whitey returned to the coop without me noticing at some point in the day, but I have no idea where it was hiding this morning.
In hindsight, I can recall yesterday at about noon seeing what I thought was a rather large raven perched on a tree above the pen, ca-cawing away at my flock. I didn't think much of it at the time- could this be the culprit who came in the night? Is it common for predatorial birds to eat only eat the neck of a chicken, leaving what to me are all of the good bits behind?
I'm trying to think of ways to prevent this in the future, beyond shutting the coop door at night. I'm not even sure this attack occured at night; for all I know it could have been yesterday evening and I might simply have not noticed. My coop has trees around it that drop leaves in the fall, so a netted roof (suggested to me by some friends) would be very difficult to maintain.
What do you guys and gals think?
I've been a long time lurker, and this is my first post here, looking for some forensic expertise and advice.
This morning I woke up to tragedy in the chicken run; which is a large fenced pen with no roof. Inside of the run is a medium sized coop, which itself has raised nesting boxes, latching doors, and a small fenced and roofed run. The birds routinely jump the fence (6 feet tall) and explore outside of the pen, but always stay within a reasonable distance of it.
Lately I got complacent with leaving the coop door open at night, because I saw the birds playing outside past dark and didn't want to ruin their fun, although it looks like some creature did that for me. When I went to visit them this morning, I immediately noticed feathers all over the place. One of my white hens (maybe Wyandotte?) was missing entirely, and my oldest roo, I believe a sussex who was very docile, was dead, surrounded in his feathers- on the opposite side of the pen from the coop. Very NSFW- I uploaded the photos behind this link for those willing to see the tragedy. His entire neck from collar to head was picked to the his spine, and there is no damage to his head or body. I am wondering what kind of critter would do this, and how I can best prevent a similar attack from occuring. My whitey returned to the coop without me noticing at some point in the day, but I have no idea where it was hiding this morning.
In hindsight, I can recall yesterday at about noon seeing what I thought was a rather large raven perched on a tree above the pen, ca-cawing away at my flock. I didn't think much of it at the time- could this be the culprit who came in the night? Is it common for predatorial birds to eat only eat the neck of a chicken, leaving what to me are all of the good bits behind?
I'm trying to think of ways to prevent this in the future, beyond shutting the coop door at night. I'm not even sure this attack occured at night; for all I know it could have been yesterday evening and I might simply have not noticed. My coop has trees around it that drop leaves in the fall, so a netted roof (suggested to me by some friends) would be very difficult to maintain.
What do you guys and gals think?
Could have been an owl. I leave my pop doors open 24/7 but my pens are all covered. If you have a game camera, put it up then you will know. Now that your birds have been discovered, the predator will be back. Here is a couple of pictures of an owl. It had killed a couple of birds a couple of nights prior. I had some crappy netting up, which I have since replaced with some good netting, and it went right through it. Luckily when I got these pictures I had already moved the rest of the birds to another coop. I have posted these pictures on some other threads. Good luck...
