I was thinking maybe more than one raptor. I watch our bald eagles often as their nest is just up the river from me. Unless they have eggs or young babies in the nest, they hunt together. We've had this same couple for at least 5 years. Their young is old enough to be left while they hunt and they are out together again. They will sit on either side of the river and watch for salmon. Unfortunately we have very few fish this year due to a hatchery mistake. It is amazing how few ducks I see on the river this year too. So, on the same day, I had the attack I described and my neighbor lost two young chickens and a young duck. Granted we have more birds of prey than just the BEs. It's obvious there is a shortage of food this year for them. Neither of us have any indication that a land predator got inside the runs, and the attacks happened during the day. But, we all live in different areas where we have different sorts of predators. I wouldn't worry about a weasel here because we don't have weasels, for example. I would worry about a raccoon or a cougar. Also I'm assuming they are in a fenced run. Free range presents a whole different puzzle to solve.
Hello all! I have some sad news... last night I came home and 7 of my hens were gone and 1 of my female ducks was gone. I had been away for the weekend and was having my neighbor do chores(he has done them multiple times) I am 100% positive that the night before they had all gotten locked up. So... my neighbor locked them all up Saturday night and then at about 5pm on Sunday, he called me and told me that one of my Wyandotte’s(who was a VERY large bird)was dead and it was laying on his front porch. He said that she didn’t have any cuts or wounds, but she did have blood coming from her mouth/beak. He then called me about an hour later and proceeded to tell me that 7 of my laying hens were gone, and one of my female ducks was also gone. My chickens and ducks are EXTREMELY good about going into their coop at night, so this was alarming. I arrived home probably 20 minutes and began to look for the missing birds. We did manage to find my blue Copper Maran that wasn’t hurt at all but was pretty traumatized, and also a light Brahma that was not in good shape. She had a small wound and was laying on her side. We also found a few small wounds on the hens that were in the coop when we got home. Later that night we found 1 of my buff orpingtons that was sadly dead... very dead. Her head was gone but her body wasn’t touched, and she was left pretty close to my house in my lawn. I did find plenty of feathers scattered around my property but not the other 4 hens and 1 Duck that I was missing
