Hawks!

[staceyl]

I started out last summer with 4 chickens. One was hit by a car last fall and this spring 2 have disappeared leaving nothing but a pile of feathers. I'm down to 1 lonely girl until my babies get big enough to go out. At first I thought we had coyotes, but a friend of mine who has had chickens forever says that the pile of feathers sounds like hawks.
So, short of not allowing them to free range anymore, what can I do? Would a rooster help? The car victim was a rooster.

 

[chickaddict]

last year I lost 1 to a hawk, 2 to a raccoon, 2 to a stray cat, and another 3 turned out to be roosters and i couldn't keep them (zoning)
This year I ordered 15. I don't know if a roo would help, my solution to the problem was replace my fence lines and order more birds. When I had the roos I did notice that they are a very effective early warning system. They pay attention to everything around them and the hens don't.

 

[D'Angelo N Va.]

A rooster would help, because like chicken addict said, roosters are alert. you could also get her some more hens to pal around with. sounds like you needs some fencing if a car got one though.