- Sep 17, 2016
- 3
- 0
- 50
Hi folks
I joined today in hopes of finding some answers. My wife and I had 4 hens, and have been issue-free for the 19 months we've lived here aside from one monster snake that we had removed (a 6.5 foot black rat snake my wife thought for a quick second was a hose, lol). We keep the 'ladies' in an enclosed coop (it's wooden and has a completed enclosed outdoors area attached), and they roam inside a fenced off area of the yard during the day. Until recently, we kept the coop open at night so they can come and go.
Wednesday afternoon my wife texted me saying one of our ladies was missing. There were feathers scattered inside the coop, and I found her remains about 20 feet away, inside the fenced in area of their range. Our fence is 5ft tall, has 3 horizontal 1x4 slats, and chicken wire stapled so that it's closed off to the forest behind us. The remains were mostly intact, but the head was missing, and a little was eaten from the front and back. I found no tracks.
Last night, I had locked up our three ladies around dusk; immediately attached to the coop is a fully enclosed area (about 5x7) with a door, which I closed (but did not latch). The coop itself has a wooden door that swings down from above (closed, not latched). I dropped off some grapes at the time, and all three hens were inside.
This morning I go to let them out, and only two hens were inside. Both the drop down wooden door and the gate door were closed. The wooden door actually wouldn't open from the outside (I have a piece of 550 cord tied to it so I can pull it open from outside the fence), so I went inside the coop to break it free, and noticed the missing bird.
I found her remains in the fenced in area, about 20 feet from where the other bird was. Similar damage although more was eaten from the breast.
I can't figure out how a predator and the bird would have gotten out, I couldn't open the coop door and the other one was closed too much for a bird to pass through. Unless the predator was inside the coop when I went in there, and was the 'third' girl I saw on the roost? It was dusk but not dark, so I think I'd have noticed a furry chicken... and I hadn't had anything to drink by that point of the evening.
I have looked at the sticky threads here and done some other research, so it smells like a raccoon is my likely culprit?
We have a lot of hawks and eagles, and I saw a hawk yesterday that got the girls all riled up, but I don't think he would have gotten a kill inside the coop.
I live in eastern CT by the shoreline; we also have coons, fishers, foxes, coyotes, and apparently there have been several bobcat and mountain lion sightings within a half mile recently (or so my barber tells me, and what barber would ever stretch the truth).
I got this photo of the scat; it's fairly meaty, for lack of a better term, and had seeds. It was 3 feet from the second set of remains.
I also have a photo of the remains of hen # 2, although I won't post it unless requested. As last time, I found no tracks.
Since the first girl was killed, we've also only had 1 egg, whereas in the past we'd get 3 per day. I don't know which bird was the non-layer other than it was one of my RI Reds, since we would get 2 browns and 1 white per day, and I had 3 reds and one spotted hen.
I assume that they were killed in the coop then removed for eating?
Thanks for any thoughts!
Ryan
I joined today in hopes of finding some answers. My wife and I had 4 hens, and have been issue-free for the 19 months we've lived here aside from one monster snake that we had removed (a 6.5 foot black rat snake my wife thought for a quick second was a hose, lol). We keep the 'ladies' in an enclosed coop (it's wooden and has a completed enclosed outdoors area attached), and they roam inside a fenced off area of the yard during the day. Until recently, we kept the coop open at night so they can come and go.
Wednesday afternoon my wife texted me saying one of our ladies was missing. There were feathers scattered inside the coop, and I found her remains about 20 feet away, inside the fenced in area of their range. Our fence is 5ft tall, has 3 horizontal 1x4 slats, and chicken wire stapled so that it's closed off to the forest behind us. The remains were mostly intact, but the head was missing, and a little was eaten from the front and back. I found no tracks.
Last night, I had locked up our three ladies around dusk; immediately attached to the coop is a fully enclosed area (about 5x7) with a door, which I closed (but did not latch). The coop itself has a wooden door that swings down from above (closed, not latched). I dropped off some grapes at the time, and all three hens were inside.
This morning I go to let them out, and only two hens were inside. Both the drop down wooden door and the gate door were closed. The wooden door actually wouldn't open from the outside (I have a piece of 550 cord tied to it so I can pull it open from outside the fence), so I went inside the coop to break it free, and noticed the missing bird.
I found her remains in the fenced in area, about 20 feet from where the other bird was. Similar damage although more was eaten from the breast.
I can't figure out how a predator and the bird would have gotten out, I couldn't open the coop door and the other one was closed too much for a bird to pass through. Unless the predator was inside the coop when I went in there, and was the 'third' girl I saw on the roost? It was dusk but not dark, so I think I'd have noticed a furry chicken... and I hadn't had anything to drink by that point of the evening.
I have looked at the sticky threads here and done some other research, so it smells like a raccoon is my likely culprit?
We have a lot of hawks and eagles, and I saw a hawk yesterday that got the girls all riled up, but I don't think he would have gotten a kill inside the coop.
I live in eastern CT by the shoreline; we also have coons, fishers, foxes, coyotes, and apparently there have been several bobcat and mountain lion sightings within a half mile recently (or so my barber tells me, and what barber would ever stretch the truth).
I got this photo of the scat; it's fairly meaty, for lack of a better term, and had seeds. It was 3 feet from the second set of remains.
I also have a photo of the remains of hen # 2, although I won't post it unless requested. As last time, I found no tracks.
Since the first girl was killed, we've also only had 1 egg, whereas in the past we'd get 3 per day. I don't know which bird was the non-layer other than it was one of my RI Reds, since we would get 2 browns and 1 white per day, and I had 3 reds and one spotted hen.
I assume that they were killed in the coop then removed for eating?
Thanks for any thoughts!
Ryan
