raccoon attack hens beak chewed off.

[zinia8]

had a raccoon try to pull a hen through the fence, thought she was dead but she is not. Dam raccoon chewed her beak off. I think she has puncture wounds in the top of her mouth into her sinus, she still has her tongue. Should I try to save her or cull and put her out of her misery. I am sick to my stomach and so upset. I wiped some of the blood off and put her in a box in a dark room. I lost one to what I thought was a cat but apparently it is the raccoon. I closed all the windows on the coop they do have hardware cloth on them but I am not taking any chances pop door is locked and trap is set. I will have great pleasure in taking care of this raccoon.

 

[lazy gardener]

Yes, the merciful thing to do would be to cull her ASAP. Then, if I was in your yard, I'd be looking to kill the coon, and the rest of his cousins. An other first priority is to make sure that the run/coop are predator proof, either with electric fencing around the run, or putting up hardware cloth.

 

[lazy gardener]

Exactly what do you have covering your coop windows? 1/2" hdw. cloth, or something else? So sorry.

 

[danceswithronin]

I would cull personally to avoid the hen suffering any further since she will never be able to eat properly with her beak like that. I'm sorry this happened to your girl.

 

[zinia8]

Exactly what do you have covering your coop windows? 1/2" hdw. cloth, or something else? So sorry.

yes 1/2 hardware cloth on the windows. pulled her through the run fence which is just 2x4? horse/cattle fence. Closed the coop tight for the night. set the trap and guess what not 3 hours later.

 

[zinia8]

Lazy Gardener you use electric netting from premier?
I have regular glass window panes with hardware cloth on the inside with it attached to the frames then sandwiched with a nailed down wooden batten. does that make sense. my brain doesn't want to work right now.

 

[zinia8]

I would cull personally to avoid the hen suffering any further since she will never be able to eat properly with her beak like that. I'm sorry this happened to your girl.

Think that will probably be the best option.

 

[micstrachan]

I’m so sorry. We had a raccoon pull an entire bunny through the same type of wire you show on the left side of your photo. It’s only about an inch wide, right? Ours is a puppy pen we use as a daytime bunny run and poor bunny was accidentally left out one night.

 

[The Phantom]

So sorry. I would put her down. I'm sure she has had an amazing life... I would not want her to suffer any more.
I also have been blasting those suckers. They killed my pair of pheasants worth $600. They were so sweet and cool.
We have killed 8 in the past 5 days. Along with some opossums.

 

[micstrachan]

Wow! That’s a lot of raccoon and opossums!