Heard the dog barking in the dark out back…

[StarfishPrime]

We were inside at the kitchen table and heard Daisy barking outside. It’s dark out. That was odd. So, I head out the door with my machete and flashligt, shine it all around behind our house and see eyes light up over at our coop. I head closer and notice three sets of eyes looking back at me. Three coons were camped out on the wall in our outdoor covered run in between the rafters…and the coop door was still wide open.

Anyway, long story short…I pressed the button to close the coop door and tried scaring off the coons by banging the machete against the wood, to no avail.

Now I’m wondering if they’ll camp out all night until morning. Is that a reasonable suspicion?

 

[RubelliteRose]

Glad you got the door shut in time! Good job Daisy
My neighbor has had a lot of raccoons around his coop. They may not stay until morning, but they will hang out much of the night.
Is the coop protected by chicken wire or is that just on the run? I ask because our neighbor has a chicken wire run and the raccoons rip through it like it is tissue paper He is constantly patching the holes.
Now that they have found you, they will be back. If you can, I would highly recommend using hardware cloth at least on the coop. We have only seen raccoon tracks around our run once. I think they have figured out that they can't get through the hardware cloth and mostly leave us alone.

 

[StarfishPrime]

Glad you got the door shut in time! Good job Daisy
My neighbor has had a lot of raccoons around his coop. They may not stay until morning, but they will hang out much of the night.
Is the coop protected by chicken wire or is that just on the run? I ask because our neighbor has a chicken wire run and the raccoons rip through it like it is tissue paper He is constantly patching the holes.
Now that they have found you, they will be back. If you can, I would highly recommend using hardware cloth at least on the coop. We have only seen raccoon tracks around our run once. I think they have figured out that they can't get through the hardware cloth and mostly leave us alone.

This is where our flock lives:

The pictures were taken under the roof on the left. The enclosed part is a solid wood box, so the coons won’t be getting in there.