That’s how this started, me taking away the food source for the predators. The deceased pigeon was part of a pair that had been living in my horse shed since the summer. There had been a raccoon in the shed attacking the pigeons one night, the first one I’ve seen on property in the year and a half I’ve lived here. My thinking there was that by removing the pigeons from the horses shed, the raccoon would carry on. I had been in the process of rehoming the pigeons (it was in quarantine) when the weasel struck. I had no sign of them previously but still made sure my coop was secure enough against them.
It hasn’t penetrated my chicken coops yet thankfully, I am planning on looking them over today for any gaps 1/2” or more after the sighting, but I’m still terminating the rodent when it is caught. Once they know they can get a meal somewhere, they will be back again. This one may be eating all the field mice we have in the garage and that’s why it was drawn there, but how do you remove field mice when that’s all your surroundings are is fields.
With the hotwire, I’m thinking it’s something like electric fencing? How would that work for weasels? Wouldn’t they just find a way around it if there’s still an opening into the coop? Is the hotwire something that needs to be added onto the costs of all the 1/4”-1/2” HWC needed to make a chicken coop/run secure enough against weasels/mink?
How do you “train” wild animals? Unless you have magic, I don’t think anything can stop them from showing up. They will always come back for the off chance they could get in this next time. Electric fencing doesn’t stop the coyotes from walking through the horses pasture, even though my medium sized dog can’t get under/through it without being shocked. I’m not saying they don’t learn from the hotwire, they just don’t get trained to stay away
brave little rascal!
