OCTOBER chicken sacrifice protection

[PirateGirl]

Sadly, your husband is very realistic. This is a real issue where I live. Even the news will issue warnings to people to keep all their pets inside, especially black cats.

Thank you. I don't want to be paranoid because my cat loves going out, but I also want the best for him. My husband and I grew up in different parts of the country, so our experiences are different. What is safe some places, certainly may not be others. Also as an adult having met many people in my life from around the world I'm realizing how sheltered my childhood was and how homogeneous our community was. There are many cultures and races and religions that I was oblivious to as a child. Whether others are extremists or mentally unsound or simply practice a different religion with different rituals, the fact of the matter is that people are unpredictable and we all do what we can to keep our pets and friends and family safe.

So that being said, I hope all reading this have a happy and safe holiday season, whatever holidays you partake in (I know there are quite a few coming up for many cultures/religions).

 

[Kessel23]

I do not lock up my coop. We have 3 dog kennels right next to it and it is hard for anything to get near the coop without waking up the whole neighborhood. Last winter we had human wandering around on the property, he kept the dogs up all night. He would sneak in through a girl scout camp that bordered our land and we saw him a few times at night when we were leaving or returning to the house. Me and my sisters were driving home and we saw a hooded man on the edge of our woods, we slowed down and he ran into the woods. He would only come around a few days each week and the dogs would go crazy, I would yell to them to be quiet and then we would listen by the window. We let a few people hunt on our land and they have trail cams set up, they caught a few pictures of him and it was a unarmed man with a hoodie on. We never got a close up picture and once one trail camera had caught him he would not go through there again. I wonder what the hell he was trying to do, who has the time to be wandering around on someone else's property in the dead of winter in a hoodie? We got rid of him by letting out the dogs when they barked, we did this a few times and he stopped coming. We never contacted the police, we used to have to deal with creeps like him all the time. There was a bar right up on a hill behind our barn and the drunks would come down and break our stuff and hurt our animals.

I do not think someone was trying to steal your chickens, it was probably just some teens having a party and the chickens got spooked by something. If you are really worried then lock up the coop and get a camera out there.

 

[roosterhavoc]

I found this guy wandering around in the backyard. He was just roasting weenies in the fire pit. No harm done.

 

[Ginmary]

It is a common occurrence that many cat rescues and shelters will not adopt out black cats during October.

 

[Cyprus]

I live in the suburbs of wisconsin. Very large wooden 1 acre lots . Something I thought I would never have to deal with.

What? I live in Wisconsin too. On five acres in suburban WI.
This never happens. What city are you in?

 

[belindaschicks]

I also have a bar on top of my street so I am used to drunks. This was no bonfire party im used to those. It's wisconsin. Bonfire parties are a nightly thing around here. You would have just had to have been there to understand this was something different. Just like you know when an animal has been at your coop you know when an unwanted person has been there also. Slow rythmic drumming with no other sound. Somthing was not right. This was not the first time I have had an unwanted person. I mentioned the bar. I was never afraid of the drunks. They were just making there way home. They just look in and walk away.

 

[Cyprus]

What city do you live in? I'm curious.

 

[Kessel23]

I also live in Wisconsin. I am still not sure what you are talking about or how you "know" there was a human in the coop. I also do not "know" when an animal has visited the coop, unless a chicken goes missing or something gets damaged then most animals are ignored or go unnoticed by me. If it was me, I would have just gone out there and see what was up, if it was so unusual then why not go and find out what is going on? Slow rhythmic drumming reminds me of my dad, he would get drunk while camping and go sit out by the fire and play the drums with his cousin.

 

[EggWalrus]

If I stand by my coop and see the flicker of a fire, somebody's in big trouble.

. My neighbors are letting a hurricane family from Florida camp in their yard and I can see their camp fire they cook over and sit around at night. I think they are Puerto Ricans, Guatemalans or Haitians. I wonder if they really are hurricane refugees or if they might just be taking advantage of kindness.
I've also caught one of them eyeballing my birds when they walked to town, and I've been coming up short on eggs since the hurricane but I think it's just the short days making the girls put on the brakes. I've also caught crack/meth heads parking on my private road/drive and smoking that crap. Maybe I need to start padlocking my birds. A dishonest person may think I wouldn't notice if they stole a few birds out of 100+ and they would be right. It's just about impossible to do a head count every day. Maybe I need to get some motion sensor lights also for the driveway.

 

[rosemarythyme]

I've had people sleeping on my driveway, teens hiding in the bushes... more innocent I guess are the folks who pick berries off the driveway since at least it's obvious what they're doing there.

My coop door does have a lock but I've never locked it. If my dogs do their job I shouldn't have to wonder if there's anyone around outside.