Is anyone NOT bothered by predators?

[Henrietta23]

Not routinely. We have had one loss to a fox. The hens are in our backyard which is fenced to keep them and our dogs in. It is not meant to keep anything out though it may slow them down. We've only seen one deer in our yard in over 20 years! They're all over this area. We are in a heavily wooded area with trees all around the edges of the propery. We once flew over in a small plane and I was amazed to see that little of our yard was visible from the sky. There are lots of hawks and owls around but so far we've been lucky. We've never had more than 7 hens at a time so maybe we don't attract th predators as much? Don't know. And the smell from the dogs may help discourage them as well. We have three of our own plus a Newfoundland on one side and three German Shepherds on the other. Behind us in forest. Once one of my hens got under the fence on the side with the shepherds and spent a good part of an afternoon hanging out with them. They luckily didn't bother her at all!

 

[doghamstyluv95]

So far no losses. We live in a very urban area so the only predators we get are my dog, and an annoying groundhog. We also see a lot of big crows but the crows are scared of us.

 

[speckledhen]

Crows are definitely my friends around here! More than once they've mobbed a hawk and chased it away from my property; same for blue jays.

 

[ModelChickens]

Our chickens are now about 30 weeks old- 3 anacondas, 1 rhode island red and 1 rooster- oops. They have not laid a single egg. My friend and I got them at the same time; hers are laying like crazy. She has more than I do, but otherwise all the same...
They are in a fancy/ spacious fully enclosed cage to keep the dogs and predators out, have a perfect coop inside with 2 feathered nests, they get all the mash, corn/veggies and water they could want. It hasnt gone below freezing here.
My only thought is that our 2 spaniels aka bird dogs "watch" them all day and unfortunately got in the cage by accident got in the cage 2 at different times.
Could the chickens be traumatized? I cant find any information on this in the books.
Help.

 

[ivan3]

1. six foot welded wire fencing/hardware cloth over all windows.
2. Baby monitor in coop/turkey shed
3. Armed/supervised free ranging (no exceptions)
4. 3 havaharts/2 legholds (currently)/snares as required
5. Preemptive retirement of Whatever chicken eating predators happen on this property domestic/wild
6.Continually taking cue from roo (naturally attentive/merciless).

Even so, we've lost one to a fox and had to stitch up another girl rescued from another fox, as well as our Royal Palm hen taken in the middle of the afternoon by a raccoon (never assume predators stick to a `natural' schedule if dinner is served `after' hours...).

We are predator heavy (avg. 30 raccoons a year x10 yr.), not to mention all other species of chicken eating vermin.

Chickens and turkeys and Southern Nocturnal Flying Squirrels seem to appreciate the effort.
I also never forget that everything alive is a predator (only differences are in the means of securing, and the choice, of forage).
Reduction in the overall frequency of predaton is possible, but never complete.

keep those girls safe!

 

[halo]

Quote:
I hope you dont mean you have 3 anacondas.....

 

[speckledhen]

I'm sure ModelChickens meant Anconas. Anacondas would definitely eat the chickens, LOL!

 

[rooster-red]

Being close to a state park and having a power line right of way behind us, we have our share of preditors.

For 2 years now i've lost none. (knock on wood)

 

[deborah]

I am very sad right now. We are on vacation and we just got a call from the person who has been caring for our chickens telling us we lost one today. This is our first loss. We got 12 barred rocks in May.

We live in Michigan. We just spent a week in Florida. We are on our way back and spending tonight in Tenesee. He called a short time ago, but there is so much we don't know yet. Like which of our girls we lost. We won't be home until tomorrow evening, so we won't know until then.

He told us that when he came to lock them up this evening, they were crowded together under an overhang of our house. He said they were spooked and it was difficult to get them to come out and go into the henhouse. He found the dead chicken a short distance away. It's guts were eaten out.

We had a hawk harrassing the chickens this fall, but we have not noticed him around lately. We allow our chickens to free-range in a large fenced area. Their coop is secure. The henhouse (8X8) has hardware cloth over the windows. The attached run (8X12) has a roof and hardware cloth. We dug out the perimeter and buried hardware cloth a foot down and a foot out. We've seen some digging around the coop, but nothing has gotten very far.

We told the person taking care of our chickens to only let them in the run tomorrow so they will be more secure. While we were gone to Florida, we took our German Shepheard to a family member. In hindsight, I wish we had directed the caretaker to keep them in the run every day. We talked about that before we left, but I was worried about confining them when they are so used to free ranging.

This is very difficult. We didn't intend it to happen when we first got them, but they have become our pets. They are very friendly. They come running to us all the time. They enjoyed being picked up and held. They grab your pants if your don't pick them up quickly enough. It's very difficult this evening because we don't know which one we lost. I keep thinking we should have had them only in the run while we were gone; that we should have left the dog home, and so on.

It's a hard lesson. I know we will make some changes when we get home to try to make sure this doesn't happen again. And we will be ready for this predator when it returns.


Deb & Steve

 

[Miss Sue]

I'm sorry about your Barred Rocks. I lost two last week to either a fox or coyote. They had been out free-ranging around the yard; they never went far. I think it happened around dusk. We didn't hear a thing, but we did have music playing inside.

The Barred Rocks were the sweetest of our four chickens; the other two are brother/sister Blue Orpingtons. The rooster and his sister had returned to the coop but not the others. That's how I knew something was wrong. I found one of the Barred Rocks (not alive) and saw something trotting off. At first I thought it was a fox, but now I've heard there are also coyotes in the neighborhood, so it could have been that.

We miss our Barred Rocks a lot. They were always the first to greet me, certain that I had a treat for them. They'd come when I called them, too. I'm not going to let the others out to free-range any more unless I'm out in the yard, too.

Meanwhile a neighbor found a little stray hen in his garage and gave it to us. So, a little happiness amid the sadness...

Susan
SW Connecticut