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[Debbie292d]

Hiya, and welcome to BYC!

I'm so sorry about your losses. There are ways to protect your chickens, but we need to know your setup first. Many of us raise chickens protected from nearby raccoons, foxes, bobcats, wolves, hawks, and even bears.

 

[007Sean]

Howdy, and Welcome to Backyard Chickens.

Happy to have you here with us. Enjoy your time here at BYC!

Thanks for joining our community!

 

[Gregslezak]

Welcome to Backyard Chickens. This is a great place to explore and hang out. Hard to protect are you letting them free run or ?

They are in an enclosed coop with a smaller run at night, then I let them out to free-range during the day until dusk. Then they go back in the enclosed coop/run for the night.
I believe the eaten bird "flew the coop" over the 4' fence around their larger "open" run area.
I found her outside the fence, with no signs of infiltration into the run. She was mostly intact except for the missing head/neck...

 

[Gregslezak]

Hiya, and welcome to BYC!

I'm so sorry about your losses. There are ways to protect your chickens, but we need to know your setup first. Many of us raise chickens protected from nearby raccoons, foxes, bobcats, wolves, hawks, and even bears.

Well if have an enclosed coop/run surrounded by a larger fenced in area. The fence is 4' and the area it encapsulates is about 1,200sqf. There is 18" of 1/2" hardware cloth buried below the fence around the area. There is a pretty good tree canopy to hide them from aerial predators but nothing to keep them from flying over the fence.
I may need to clip their flight feathers until they grow a bit heavier to shorten the flight range.
They are only 7 weeks from hatching...

 

[Gregslezak]

Hello and welcome to BYC! Glad you joined.
Sorry for your loss. Was your hen taken during the day or at night?

During the early day...just after dawn.

 

[Debbie292d]

Well if have an enclosed coop/run surrounded by a larger fenced in area. The fence is 4' and the area it encapsulates is about 1,200sqf. There is 18" of 1/2" hardware cloth buried below the fence around the area. There is a pretty good tree canopy to hide them from aerial predators but nothing to keep them from flying over the fence.
I may need to clip their flight feathers until they grow a bit heavier to shorten the flight range.
They are only 7 weeks from hatching...

Ahh, it sounds like if they stay in, they're safe; it's the escapees that get taken?

I know electric fences help some keep the predators out, but it might be cruel to use to keep them in. Perhaps some of that cheap bird netting would work until they grow up. We've used it for covering our strawberries and it's huge and only cost a few bucks.

 

[Gregslezak]

I'm looking into aviary netting to cover the whole area...I have a 40% shadecloth for my garden but it's no large enough.
What do you know about the flight feathers clipping? Would that help until the put on more weight?

 

[Gregslezak]

I didn't think they could make it over the 4' fence...
There is nothing near it that they could use as a "boost".

 

[Debbie292d]

I'm looking into aviary netting to cover the whole area...I have a 40% shadecloth for my garden but it's no large enough.
What do you know about the flight feathers clipping? Would that help until the put on more weight?

I have clipped my macaw parrots, one wing each.

Here's a very detailed article about how to do it. https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/wing-clipping.76982/

 

[Gregslezak]

Thank you. I will check it out.
As a last resort, I will travel down that road if need be.