Raccoon attack last night..

[JBarringerNC]

Around midnight last night I heard the most awful squawk from the coop outback; when I went out to investigate I found the front door wide open. My 4 chickens were no where to be found, and I seen a big coon in the back of my coop eating away at the eggs. So I locked him in there as I was going to deal with it after trying to round up the flock and see if they were just hiding... well after only locating 2 of the 4 in my flock I done away with the egg-eater in my coop.

I found a trail of feathers erratically spread throughout the property leading to a little creek on the back edge of our property line, I then seen my little cochin rooster 'Pip' torn to shreds under some brush. I am certain it was a duo of raccoons that attacked the coop at once, even though I never knew they done this in groups.. apparently one of the coons was a meat eater while the other had only tastes for eggs.

A few months ago I captured a raccoon in a trap but let it go after seeing it was only trying to get the scraps I'd left too close to their coop, but this time it was evident what had to be done to it.
I'm going to set a trap tonight with wet cat food and get the one who killed my rooster.

 

[JBarringerNC]

I left the dead raccoon right near where my dead Rooster is, just a little reminder for them.

 

[SuburbSpurs]

Fat raccoon killed my neighbors cat and my show quality d'uccles. Found the fat coon his by a car. Chopped his tail off and nailed it to the door of my coop. Haven't seen any since.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

Have any of you that trap coons use sweet things? I read that things like marshmallows and jelly type stuff work well but never have for me.

 

[chickengeorgeto]

I'm not an experienced chicken person--I don't even own chickens yet. But I was reading about predators in "Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens" earlier today, and it has a chart on predators, to help you figure out what predator got in.... For possums it says "bites on breast or thigh; entire bird eaten on site"....

Google Thieves in the Night from which ever Oklahoma university it is that is involved in agriculture research. This file has much better and more accurate information.. You can get this information for nothing except the electricity.

Now you owe me a new monitor because when Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens said that a possum eats the entire bird on sight I blew hot coffee through my nose to keep from choking on it.
Oh well, I suppose you'll find a good use for that book the next time you need to level up a bookcase or something.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

I guarantee there are WAY more than you think there are. They often do travel in gazes or family units. They don't discriminate they all eat virtually anything and everything.

Did you find the 4th chicken yet?
Raccoons took 22 birds from me last summer.

 

[JBarringerNC]

I haven't found the other lost hen yet, but I figure if she's not dead then she'll come back today sometime. I'm not as fond of her as the 2 that did survive the ordeal, so no biggie either way. But the fact that my 1st chick hatched from my homemade incubator (Pip) was torn apart like a rotisserie meal just pisses me off. He was such a great care-taker for the 3 hens, always looking out for them; even though he was wary of me (and I him) he'll be missed!!! Not sure what to do as far as replacing him, or hold off on that.


I'll get at least 1 more of these coons, since the one I killed was definitely not the one who got my rooster I'm on a mission for his partner, i'm 100% sure he's going to hurt when I catch him.

 

[angelbrenn]

Last year I went outside because I heard a disturbance and took a flashlight because I heard noise in the tree saw one possum peeking out of one tree and there was five raccoons in the other tree got my traps set up caught one every night for a week then kept the trap up iand over that the rest of the year I can't one about every month never leave my trap unset anymore.

 

[JBarringerNC]

Ya know, I grew up in the country with over 50-60 chickens and ducks at my grandparents. I don't really remember any times where we lost chickens due to Raccoon attacks.. they seem to be a much larger problem for backyard chickens in the city limits.
There must be a massive population of raccoon and fox within the city limits, you'd think something could be done about this explosion of varmints; like putting a pelt bounty on them..lol

 

[moetrout]

People hunt and trap coons in the country. they also get eaten by other predators, like coyotes. In the city they have busy streets and cars as their only "predator".