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- #11
- Jun 3, 2011
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Quote:
The first coop I built was a "tractor" type A-frame with the bottom section secured by hardware cloth. The instructions I had for it recommended making one corner solid wood panel, not ro have wire all the way around. Chickens will NOT run to the middle, center, when predators frighten them, but will all go huddle in a corner. Racoons know this, and if they work in a team (which is often the case with a mom and kits) they will frighten the chooks into a corner where they can be grabbed through wire.
Having a solid wall corner saves them from that fate.
Great advice, thanks!
This appeared to be a situation in which the hen was just caught off guard (they are accustomed to having the dog and the cats and the deer, and who knows who else coming up near the coop but not causing them any harm, and they are young -- just 3 1/2 months -- so they might not have been as alarmed as they ought to have been by movement near the run), at about 4 in the afternoon (definitely not dusk here). Anyway, I can see from the feathers of all the other birds piled up against the opposite side that when it happened, they all ran there and panicked, which would have made them an easy target for another raccoon, had there been one waiting (and if the run weren't made of a welded wire dog kennel with 3' high hardware cloth all around except at that fateful doorway).
It is humbling to see how even the smallest weakness in the design of a run or coop can allow a predator access... Thanks for the input and for all the consolations -- I'm not terribly sentimental about the chickens (well, not all of them anyway
), but I do feel a strong sense of responsibility to keep them safe, so it's hard not to feel a little guilty...
The first coop I built was a "tractor" type A-frame with the bottom section secured by hardware cloth. The instructions I had for it recommended making one corner solid wood panel, not ro have wire all the way around. Chickens will NOT run to the middle, center, when predators frighten them, but will all go huddle in a corner. Racoons know this, and if they work in a team (which is often the case with a mom and kits) they will frighten the chooks into a corner where they can be grabbed through wire.
Having a solid wall corner saves them from that fate.
Great advice, thanks!
This appeared to be a situation in which the hen was just caught off guard (they are accustomed to having the dog and the cats and the deer, and who knows who else coming up near the coop but not causing them any harm, and they are young -- just 3 1/2 months -- so they might not have been as alarmed as they ought to have been by movement near the run), at about 4 in the afternoon (definitely not dusk here). Anyway, I can see from the feathers of all the other birds piled up against the opposite side that when it happened, they all ran there and panicked, which would have made them an easy target for another raccoon, had there been one waiting (and if the run weren't made of a welded wire dog kennel with 3' high hardware cloth all around except at that fateful doorway).
It is humbling to see how even the smallest weakness in the design of a run or coop can allow a predator access... Thanks for the input and for all the consolations -- I'm not terribly sentimental about the chickens (well, not all of them anyway
I have a chicken tractor inside a dog run. We just had put 2 baby chicks we had just hatched in the bottom of the run part of the tractor. Not knowing how small of an area a coon can get into....the top of the run is that 2x4 inch wire the rest is chicken wire. No signs of digging and had just put extra chicken wire around outside of dog run, to prevent babies from escaping in case they got out of the tractor. Well this morning my DH came and got me out of bed and told me that one of my hens and both chicks were dead. I was heartbroken. Is there anything that keeps these predators away? Sorry for everyones losses.
