Possum

[jemagsy]

Okay I brought a possum problem upon myself. I just realized last night he has been eating my hen's food at night. I had noticed we'd gone through a bag of layer food **really** quick - like six weeks for one hen. Also the food bucket where we keep it outside has been getting rolled down the hill into the woods until I started keeping it *in* the coop.

I know I can gather up all the food at night and save myself some heartache there, but I'm worried about my little 5 week old chickens.

I chased it off last night and fired some rat shot at it with our .38, but I do *not* want to kill it because I haven't seen it messing with the babies. However, now that I'm taking away his other food do you think he'll try and get in the coop with them??

I'm more than likely going to go get a live trap today but was wondering what ya'll thought. We just started keeping the little ones outside last night.

 

[MissPrissy]

It is eating the chicken food because so far it hasn't been able to get itself a chicken dinner. It knows the chickens are there and it won't stop coming back until it gets what it wants. I hope your coop and run are built like Fort Knox. If you don't remove the predator and stop it from coming back eventually it will find a way to breech your security. It will not stop with one chicken. It will continue until there is no more chickens at all.

You can try a have-a-heart trap and catch but rehoming wild animals is illegal. It is also immoral to dump it at someone else's place and have it prey on their livestocks.

 

[Bi0sC0mp]

well if it was me i would just shoot it and end the problem before it gets worse..he now knows where the food is and he wont go away anytime soon

 

[amazondoc]

Trap and relocate to some nice woods somewhere.

 

[willheveland]

get rid of him.If he is that close it is only a matter of time. trust me Will