I need advice on dealing with a big fat murderous raccoon!

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No the FIRST error was using chicken wire. Welded wire and hardware cloth will help a lot.

In my experience, if you scare off the coon once in a night, it won't come back until the next night. Of course there are always exceptions, but that's been my experience thus far. (Skunks and possums, on the other hand, will come back before you can set up post and finish a cigarette.) If you scared it off last night, then tonight is the night to set the trap. It WILL be back when it thinks you aren't looking.

Youngsters will return immediately. Ive had three of them do so. Two of them diddn't survive when they came back within twenty minutes. The big mature ones are smart enough to wait.
 
We've used tuna in our have-a-heart traps and have had great success trapping coons. Our girls are locked away in their coop at night, but I still worry. We've also had fox scream/barking at night and I can only imagine that the chickens get stressed when they hear it too.
 
Hey, Dr Tom...my brother in law takes large diameter PVC piping and cuts it to an appropriate length. Then he smears the inside of the pipe with crisco or better yet bacon grease. He buries one end in the dirt at a steep angle and at an appropriate depth. He drops the offending varmint's favorite food down into the pipe...critter crawls into the pipe to get the food and BINGO...he can't get out because he can't get any traction to back out...plus it's too steep. Make sure you only grease the portion of pipe that is in the ground. You don't want him to barely get in there and realize it's slippery before he gets all the way end....

Let me know if you try this and if it works for you....I've not tried it yet but I have a chicken murdering coon as well!
 
Funny thing I just wrote on line about a similar problem, just to tell u im sorry for ur loss. This morning I lost a baby chick, 2 bannies ,& a 4 mo. old buff orpington. We r gonna set a live trap for the coon, im sure its a coon, and take the necessary precactions so it wont happen again! Coon meet Remington!!
 
Friend of mine gave me a roo. He's HURGE compared to my 2 month olds so he gets the full run of the ranch. I told my friend he was gonna free range it and I hope that he would survive. My husband is a little disgruntled about the crowing he does throughout the day. He says, "somebody needs to buy him a Timex so he knows what time he's supposed to crow..." LOL. He's so beautiful I named him ROLEX. Rolex keeps close to the pen containing my 8 young chickens, in fact he roosts on top of the coop come nightfall. I have fallen in LOVE with this roo. He seems kinda protective. If he happens to be away from the coop (which is rare and never out of eye sight of the coop) and he sees me come outside heading for the coop....he comes siddling up beside me as if to inquire, "...and what business shall you be doing here at the coop". It's really quite funny. (I'm no chicken psychologist and for all I know he may be coming up to me wondering if I have something good to eat).

Last nite, my husband woke me up about midnite and told me he didn't think I'd be hearing "my boy" doing any crowing in the morning as he heard Rolex going across the front porch and was sure something got after him. He said he grabbed the flashlight but couldn't find anything or anything of Rolex. I was really upset as I had fallen in love with this rooster after only 2 days of having him. I am SO relieved...my hubby woke me this morning and said, "Your boy made it...he just crowed. He was an hour late but he made it". I was SO happy. I went outside and looked at him and said, "Atta boy, Rolex...I'm SO proud of you". He followed me to the coop walking tall and struttin' as always.

I went to the front porch looking for evidence. I traced his feather trail from about 20 feet from the coop, across the porch down past 3 horse paddocks. I think he must've been caught pretty good at the half way mark as there were a BUNCH of feathers. To look at him, you wouldn't know something got a hold of him. He's still beautiful, minus a few feathers which you don't notice.

I hope he flogs the crap out of whatever "snatched" at him. I put my game cam out so maybe I"ll know what I'm dealing with. I almost KNOW it's a coyote. He's brave too because there's a new subdivision right at the back of the coop. There's a small patch of woods you can see through. He even took a dump about 6-7 ft from the coop. If Rolex wasn't such a big rooster I'd put him in with the 2 months old but I know THAT would be a disaster.

I'm happy I still have Rolex...I hope he is always able to outdo what ever chases him...

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I agree with others...no poison! The traps work great, you can get them at your feed store such as TSC, Mize or Ace. They run from $50-$100.

Here is what has worked for me. We trap them using just about any kind of food. We catch one almost every time we set the trap. We then take it to the animal shelter and they put them to sleep and dispose of them properly. I don't know what the laws are where you live, but here the animal control is very accomodating. They won't come pick them up, we have to take them there but it is still easy. The only thing they ask is for us to call ahead of time and tell them we are bringing one. The first time we took one there, we said we would probably be bringing more. They said, no propblem, that is what they are there for!

This eliminates the problems of "relocating" a coon that could be rabid and this doesn't deal with the overpopulation problem.
This way you don't have to deal with the messy job of shooting them! (Which is ok if you have a gun and have the will to do it)
It also gives you peace of mind that the animal is gone from your property never to return, it will be disposed of legally and you never even have to waste good ammo!
 
LilBiddy, You know that predator will be back for a rematch. Isn't there a place to put Rolex at night? He is a beautiful boy. When I want to intergrate new birds, I use an exercise pen meant for dogs. I put the ex pen in the coop, put in the stranger and within 2 weeks there are no problems. You can put him out during the day and at night into the ex pen. I'd really hate to know that you lost a nice creature like him.
 
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