Hawk or Fox?

[TrialNerror]

Yesterday, sometime around 6 pm, a five-month-old pullet was taken. It was basically wide open in the backyard and we only found two gigantic piles of feathers. No blood, no feet, nothing other than loads of feathers. I can't imagine she had many feathers left. We're just trying to figure out what to be on the lookout for so any advice is appreciated. We have lost birds to dogs before but we always either find a carcass or a much smaller pile of feathers so I'm kind of thinking it wasn't that. The other 19 were out free-ranging during this time as well.

 

[50-45-1]

6:am is pretty early.
I would guess a fox unless these are small chicks that a hawk could fly off with.
I never let my chickens out before 9am.
Lock up the remainder as what ever it was will return for more.

 

[TrialNerror]

6:am is pretty early.
I would guess a fox unless these are small chicks that a hawk could fly off with.
I never let my chickens out before 9am.
Lock up the remainder as what ever it was will return for more.

Oy! That should've said 6PM! I let them out around 5:30 pm, hubs found all the feathers before 7pm.

 

[Irmasmom]

I had a fox take a hen around 6pm. No body ever found but a trail of feathers leading off Into the woods. I didn’t see it happen but when I noticed a hen missing I put them all away... same night saw a fox lurking around my barn and for weeks afterwards! Pretty confident that’s what it was

 

[TrialNerror]

That's exactly what we thought. Scary predator because they're so smart!