Opinion - Fox or Raccoon?

Well, last night I told my daughter to lock up the remaining chicken around 7:30, 8-ish. She called me at 7:30 to say when she went out to the chicken pen she saw something gray and bushy tailed go up and over the fence out of the pen.
I brought Prudence into the garage tonight and put her in a dog crate. I've re-baited the trap with some watermelon and some paper towel soaked in vanilla extract. I'm really hoping whatever it was comes tonight.
I sleep like the dead, so if anything makes noise out there at night, I don't hear it at all. Maybe I will have to start drinking a coke at dinner so I don't sleep so well. I just want to catch it so I can finally know what it really was!
 
Gray and bushy tailed. That could still be either a fox or coon. LOL. Did it jump the fence or climb? I think a coon will be more apt to climb the fence, while a fox to leap.

She couldn't tell what it was? A gray fox will look like a cat with a big tail from the distance. I think a coon has more of a scuffling/lumbering gait. I could be wrong. Every time I've seen a gray fox in the wild, I thought it to be a cat until I was just a few feet away. (I was one horse-back they "freeze" on the trail right in the path of the horse, I've seen about 3 this way.)

-Kim
 
I'm with you - my first thought was a cat since you state you live in suburbia.

A Maine coon cat could diffently climb a fence and kill a chicken - and any cat would/could carry it off.

Hurry and fence off the top of your coop!!!

Good luck!

Cyndi
 
She's a pretty good artist, so I asked her to draw me a picture of what she saw. She drew the back end of a gray animal, dark bushy tail hanging down, as it was already half way over the fence - complete with little lines to indicate movement, LOL. So, no, I guess I am no closer to figuring out what it actually was! I have baited the trap with watermelon, vanilla extract on cotton, strawberries, milk shake, stinky wet cat food, and a big chunk of rotisserie chicken (I would get caught in a trap if it had rotisserie chicken in it!) but not all at the same time. I've always had a couple of different items in there each time.
My animal control officer friend (ironic, because I'm not allowed to have chickens here!) said I ought to try a cut up boiled egg. I'm putting out quite the buffet here!
Anyway, I'll keep you posted on the saga of the gray, bushy tailed animal. Thanks for your comments and interest....

Oh, and no, there are not a lot of cats here. I occasionally see a calico in the pasture, but I don't believe anyone has any long haired cats like Maine coons.
 
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This sound's like a raccoon. I had the same problem and found dead ducks one morning with blood and feathers. The raccoon then moved to the chicken coop and started attacking them. There could also be more than one. I ended up catching 6 raccoons. They were climbing my fence then carrying the chickens back out of the pen or I also found an eating one on top of the roof. Defently keep the remaining one in the garage until you catch something. Whatever it is it's going to keep coming back. I would also use a peanut butter sandwich to bait the trap this is what I was told to use and it worked REALLY WELL. It is all I use now. If the trap is a cage trap you could also hide it by putting branches over it or even putting leaves on the floor of the trap. I think it depends if the animal would eat the eggs. The raccoons ate my duck eggs but they had already killed 4 ducks. They didn't eat the chicken eggs because they had 20 chickens to choose from. Hope this helps.
 
Here are a couple of pictures of the footprints that are confusing me.

This one has prints that I think look fox like - look at the one in the middle at the top especially.

DSC07730.jpg


This one I think either looks like a raccoons back foot, or the foot of the chicken that was carried away.

DSC07731.jpg


And this is my remaining chicken, Prudence

DSC07736.jpg


And also, you'll notice that the fence has lattice on the outside, but vinyl corrugated panels on the chicken side. I would think that would be hard to climb for a raccoon, but a fox could probably jump up there.
No prints on the ground - it is pretty hard clay. There is one crinkly gray hair I found stuck to something on the fence, but again, could be from either fox or raccoon. Which is more likely to pull feathers out?
 
Those don't look much like a coon's prints. When going up a fence like that, usually the back feet will leave the clearer print(grabbing the top with front) so I am leaning towards a cat or small fox. (won't swear to it...) I am going to send these pics to a friend that rehabs wildlife and see what he says.
 
Those are fox prints . Cats prints are usually rounder and dog like animals have pointyier (Dont mind the spelling ) paws .

here are print pics
prints.gif
 
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