Predator loose with inconsistent MO - 4 dead and counting.

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Set every trap, sit and watch in a blind with a gun, set out poison/marshmallows, and I would not let my chickens out of the hen house until the yard was secure and predator caught.
Kick butt !
Play all your cards, and do not keep feeding the critter !
Gotta be a coon to crawl over the fence.
 
I'm going to have to ask around for a trap. In the mean time I'm making regular rounds every half hour with a .22 and a flash light, doing a head count and checking the fencing and scanning the woodline. Before sundown when the chitluns were bedding down I made sure that each and every one of them was roosting.

I figure its going to be a long sleepless night tonight, but I'll be darned if I'm just going to sit by and watch my babies get picked off. From what I can tell of the remains of the last kill, the time of death must have been in the wee morning hours, maybe 3-4 AM - that'll be when I tighten my patrols I guess.

If I do get a live trap and manage to catch whatever it is, I fully intend to put it down - this varmit is apparently a repeat offender, coming back year after year when my Gma gets new chickens. Problem animals, even if they're relocated to the 10 mile radius that the law dictates, will usually come back wiser for the wear and merely serves as a temporary fix.

As for the pen itself, I'm going to have to see who around here carries hardware cloth - it seems like the best thing for this at the moment. Ultimately I need to just build a new pen and add a run so they can play safely.
 
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Well...any success?
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BTW....I like your avatar...did he score?
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Best wishes on your varmit problem,
Ed
 
Making rounds won't work. The animal will hear or see you before you see it. Find a place to stay put where you can see and pop it when it shows up. A light with a red lens will not scare animals but will let you see. Good luck.
 
Well, I`m sorry to hear about your troubles. I keep a live trap set with eggs 24/7, works extremely well, but sometimes you get a critter that is just trap smart. I spent a LOT of sleepless nights doing what you are doing, to no avail. Finally someone recommended The Recipe and it works 99.9% of the time. Cats won`t touch it, but dogs, chickens, etc will. If you need it, PM me and I`ll share with you.........Pop
 
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Well - I patrolled last night every half hour, on the half hour til 2:30 in the morning (sleepiness is clearly my weakness here) and went out to check again at 4 - looks like everyone made it...for tonight anyways. On my 11:30 and 1:30 patrols I spooked something into the woods. The 11:30 one was relatively quiet in its escape (prolly no more then a cat in the leaves), but the 1:30 patrol was quite loud, sucker was booking it, whatever it was. As Papadavid said, while it appears to have scared it off for now - it doesn't seem to serve as a means to an end. No doubt it will be back tonight, now that its discovered an "easy" food source. So I'll borrow a handheld spot and camp out on top of the chicken pen - its likely to start getting suspicious now, but I hope it'll work.

So funny though, while I was out patrolling the chicks would talk to me while I did a head count and this morning the dang white leghorn roo must have been feeling crabby from the constant patrols, sucker decided to bum rush me and attack my shoelaces when I went out to feed.
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Not sure how to treat him when he does that - certainly don't want him to become a mean roo.

And yes, he did score! As far as chickens scoring goes anyways.
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Its an old pic I found of my Gma's last crop of birds, apparently they *really* hated that ball (the dog's) when it would blow around on windy days, too close to them.
 

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