Huge Snake problems

[Mimi13]

I had a huge snake problem last year and I found the solution for me was to surround my chicken house with the netting that is used to cover fruit trees. I found out accidentally when I found a snake tangled in a package I had opened, unrolled and left laying on the ground. My chicken house is about 6ft x8ft and I think it took 3 packages to surround it. I think I paid 3 or 4 dollars a package but I have never had a snake get past it. They get tangled in the net and can't out. It seems their scales get caught in the net. I just untangle them and let them go in the woods on my property on the other side of a creeek.

I’m interested to know where you got netting for that cheap?

 

[Mimi13]

This product, Wondercide, is the best I have found to kill unwanted pests and keep snakes at bay. It is 100% natural and is safe to use around children and animals, even when wet. It also will not harm the beneficial, sight-driven insects like honey bees and butterflies. The cedar oil interrupts the receptors of scent-driven insects (mosquitoes, flies, Japanese beetles) and either suffocates them or runs them off.

I know that the smell of cedar is supposedly bad for chickens so I do not spray it IN the coop, only on the outside, even though I don’t think it would harm them. (My chickens seem to prefer resting in my dogs’ houses, which have cedar shavings in them, and have suffered no ill side effects.)

When researching this product several years ago, I did read where its use would deter snakes as well. And I can testify that when used regularly, I see no snakes around the treated areas.

As far as other products (moth balls, sulfur), I do not want to subject myself to the horrible smell, not to mention one of my birds accidentally ingesting a piece of a moth ball. We all know how curious a brood of chicks can be. Everything has to be sampled. (Like me at a seafood buffet!)

As for the netting, all of my birds (chickens and ducks) free range all day and would be subject to getting caught themselves and suffering undue stress and trauma until I found them and released them.

This stuff is a little pricey, but like Elector PSP, does a marvelous job! Check it out for yourselves.

https://www.wondercide.com/products...ncentrate-kills-repels-100s-of-pests-ecotreat

 

[Rivendell Chick]

This is so reassuring! I'm wrapping everything in 1/4" hardware cloth and hoping...

Just saw a black racer out the window brazenly slithery around the front gardens. He won't fit through the hardware cloth.

And I'm feeding my young chickens greens through a xylophone on the tractor door to enrich their lives but am also seeing their killer instinct activated as they go after the stems pulling the greens through quick as a flash.

They destroyed a moth that breached their boundary. Hopefully a small snake will be pecked into submission.

Mine went nuts for a cicada this morning. Japanese beetles are also welcome Can't wait for the tomato hornworms to arrive later in the summer garden

 

[CreveChris]

Mine went nuts for a cicada this morning. Japanese beetles are also welcome Can't wait for the tomato hornworms to arrive later in the summer garden

Maybe it's OT, but as an aside, are tomato hornworms safe for chickens since tomato leaves are not? I'd raise them for my chickens, if so

 

[Rivendell Chick]

Maybe it's OT, but as an aside, are tomato hornworms safe for chickens since tomato leaves are not? I'd raise them for my chickens, if so

Totally fair question, hope some veteran chicken owners can speak to this. Every homesteader I've talked to does this, but I suspect it's like anything else and a matter of portion. They do turn up on other plants too, so I may opt for safety reasons to feed them ones I find elsewhere in the garden.

 

[CreveChris]

Totally fair question, hope some veteran chicken owners can speak to this. Every homesteader I've talked to does this, but I suspect it's like anything else and a matter of portion. They do turn up on other plants too, so I may opt for safety reasons to feed them ones I find elsewhere in the garden.

Again waaaaay OT, but I used to raise silkworms for my bearded dragon and I still have the mulberry tree I planted to feed them. So I would totally raise tomatoes, tobacco, or gogi berries (which I currently have on my pool deck) just for the worms to feed my chickens.

 

[audy5000g]

Ginny hens will scare snakes away.
Also I use snakeaway. You now can but at Walmart.

 

[Mtnboomer]

Some stores have a snake away product that is supposed to federal them. Perhaps try that? It's usually a spray that you just put around the permitter

It is hard to determine if snake away really works but at best you will need to reapply monthly.

 

[Mtnboomer]

I actually capture black snakes and relocate them into my out buildings adjacent to my coop for rodent control. My Brahmas keep them from entering the coop itself.
I have seen my hens peck and eat smaller snakes.

 

[thepick4uchicks]

We don't relocate water mocassins, which our pest manager said were washed into everyone's waterfront properties during the hurricanes (happened to us twice in the past 4 years).

We paid $400 to trap the moccasins and raccoons but caught zero. They literally won't take the bait. I bought a trap for $120 and never caught a raccoon even while they were nesting in a tree in my backyard.

So pros around here won't help, but I'm learning which snakes are which by observation. They get very comfortable with me and love the habitat we preserve and build for them. So yeah, hardware cloth is the only material I use, plus fancy screw-fastened D-ring locks on all doors.

We have two Huskies and the wildlife learn quickly when they are in the yard, and rabbits and squirrels apparently know they can't get through the fence. Squirrels will go up next to the chicken tractor to eat any black sunflower seeds the chickens left behind from the day before (the tractor is a slow lawnmower moved daily).

Ah! I have also owned one husky years ago. They are good wildlife deterrents also. They can snap an unwanted rodents or coons neck in a half a heartbeat. More quiet and faster than a trap or bullet and foolproof. My money is on them. Mine killed any animal that got into his enclosure and tried to steal his food at night. Sneaky and smart he was. He never misses his mark.