Left devastated after a racoon attack

[Attack Chicken]

I"m so sorry you had to go through that

 

[GracefulBantams]

Thanks!

 

[newbie coops]

To understand how they got them. Your birds were in a pen and not locked up in a coop?[/quote :


The fence... I am not sure what it is called, but it is about 1" x 2" rectangles and 4 or 5 feet tall. The "egg flock" were in their coop, but the door was left wide open (because we have never had this problem before!). The Silkies were in a pen like this http://www.freewebs.com/gracefulbantams/chooseyourbird.htm but their nest box did not lock, so I think that was the "weak link".
The animal (or animalS) must have crawled over the fence, because there was no sign of digging anywhere!

I'm so sorry. We had an issue many years ago, with a fisher cat (or just our assumption of one) getting one of our 10 cochins every night. They would roost in the barn and weren't penned. Finally, we thought of the bright idea (imagine that???) of turning on the electric fence...and poof!...problem solved. We had one cochin left at that point. They were the cutest little birds, and followed us everywhere.

Today, we have a flock of 23 pullets and one rooster - the roo is a NH Red, and the rest are a combination: Black Star, NH Red, Buff Orp, Barred Plymouth Rock. They are spoiled rotten, and their pens and houses are as secure as Fort Knox...until the next breach. Then they'll be as secure as Guantanamo Bay.​

 

[Majestic Lane Poultry]

I am so sorry. How heartbreaking. I worry about ours all the time. We don't keep all of ours together for that reason, but it sounds like they broke into 2 coops in one night! Frightening.

 

[emilyweck]

I hate those things. I was hanging at my cousins house the other night. She has chickens, too. We turned around as we were sitting on the porch and there were two humongous raccoons. I grabbed a pitch fork and got one and she grabbed a hose for the other.... well no raccoon has come back yet.

All her chickens are still there

Thank God!

 

[carl1949]

So sorry for your loss. The electric fence mentioned is awesome! Ever since we installed it we have had NO over the fence intruders...only one "fly in".

We have the hot wire all around the top of the fence. Don't forget you have to ground the chicken wire, so as they are climbing up and supposedly over their hind feet are on the chicken wire and their front feet on the hot wire. Works like a charm! My son witnessed a coon get the shock of his life! He let out this loud howl as he got his shock! How sweet!

 

[Shared Acres]

That is horrible. I once had the fencing for a coop and had a possum eat a show winning Silkie rooster that I only have for like 3 days!

We went to animal control and rented traps (cheap), just tell them a cat or dog is eating your livestock otherwise they may have rules about trapping possums and raccoons. We caught one the first night. Immediately killed it and set it again, just in case.

We ended up building a new coop/run with double layered chicken wire (Made it so the holes don't line up so raccoons would have a HARD time putting their hands in), wire over and wire under so nothing could crawl under or over.

I don't have a pic of the old coop that I know of, but here's some of our new one if it gives you any ideas.

The Barred Rock is on the outside:

One line of chicken wire is on the outside, the other is on the inside, leaving a 4" gap. Figured if Raccoon hands reached through that would be a problem for them as well.

 

[Cuban Longtails]

Grace, I'm so sorry. Racoon attacks are the worst.

You won't find much left of them because racoons will eat nearly the whole bird (unless they're interrupted), usually carrying the bodies away back to some sort of shelter (under bushes and brush). The time I had birds coming up missing, I found them about 100 ft from the coop, just mostly feathers and feet. Occassionally I'd find the breast bone or a leg bone. I was lucky that it was just one raccon, a small female. Your's would have nearly had to have been a family for that many birds to disappear in one night.

With both of us working, we couldn't reasonably stay up all night and wait for the racoon to come back. As mentioned on here, we purchased a set of baby monitors and set it up where the listening device was right next to my bed. Anytime the birds started making distress noises, we'd rush out to the coop. After nearly a week of this we finally were able to take care of the situation, permanently. With only the loss of one other bird (it had taken three before we started using the baby monitor), as the racoon had drug it up a tree and dropped it. That one "mistake" on the racoon's part was all it took for us to see it up at the top of a tree near the fenced in run of the coop.

 

[crackertrail]

fox or bobcat, more than a single dog. coyotes is a good possibility, they are everywhere now. raccoons are too. I am so sorry, it hurts me just to lose one.

 

[countrygirlatheart]

Graceful Bantums, I am totally with you & feel your pain. We had lost 3 of baby RIR's last week, & we thought we had "fixed" their run. We left for a weekend trip on Friday, came home yesterday to feathers all over the yard, two more of my baby RIR's & one of my Production Red Layers gone & a spot in the fence (ground level) where you can tell something had come & gone. All the others came running to the gate to "tell" when we got there. I didnt (and still dont) know whether to

or

. And to make it worse...our neighbor (we didnt ask her to feed, just gather eggs & check on them (plus it's a way to give her a "break" from her 2 yr old son who "LOVES" to play & see them) didnt even realize there were some missing!!!!!

So I completely understand and feel your pain