Raccoon broke in but left the chickens? Or did it steal from another animal???

[ShrekDawg]

The egg box lid may be heavy but a raccon can open it just enough to grab the eggs one by one.

Or one holds it open while his buddy grabs eggs. Smart little trash pandas, they are!

Never would have even thought of that!!

I’m betting one held it open because the boxes are deep, about 18 inches, and with shavings still at least a foot and I’m not sure their arms are that long? Maybe on a big one ha

 

[ColoradoPip]

I think if you lock that box lid and close the pop door, that will get you through until your new coop. That's my one cent

 

[ShrekDawg]

Set up your game cameras that your parents bought you!!!!

Yeah I’m definitely going to!! Haha

They would go for the chicken not the eggs. They're not going to choose eggs if they see chickens.

I would say it was a young coon

Yeah that was my thought as well!! I would have thought all the chickens would be dead if it was a coon so must have been young.

I think if you lock that box lid and close the pop door, that will get you through until your new coop. That's my one cent

Thanks!! I’m going to try that!! My dad doesn’t think we need to close the pop door but I don’t care. I’m doing it. I’m not taking the chance aha and going to put locks on the other gates/doors too. Although that bottom latch gets kind of swelled up with the humidity sometimes to the point I can barely open/close it without a lot of effort so I doubt a raccoon would be able to but still.

 

[centrarchid]

Is it possible some hens laying eggs under the coop?

 

[ShrekDawg]

Is it possible some hens laying eggs under the coop?

That could be!!! I never even thought about that!! I will have to start checking under there.

Although they are usually pretty good about going into the coop to lay. I’ve seen them go from across the yard inside to lay and back out after so I don’t think they’re laying under it but anything’s possible!!

I do suspect some of them might be laying under the deck though but then I would expect the eggs to be over there not by the coop.

It’s odd.

I’ll have to start checking under the coop though just in case. Some of the eggs appear to be from ones that have been reliably laying inside every day for a while so I don’t think they would suddenly stop but you never know. I’ll check and keep an eye on it because I still can’t imagine how anything got in.

 

[centrarchid]

Area under there looks like a good place to hide a nest.

 

[ShrekDawg]

Area under there looks like a good place to hide a nest.

I do know they used to dust bathe under there all the time, it was their favorite spot, but for some reason have stopped and found a new spot now. I’m not sure if they ever laid eggs under there but I’m sure they could squeeze under there and do it!! I’ll have to crawl under there, the new coop, and the deck tomorrow and check for hidden nests.

 

[GunnyBun]

I know it seems like a raccoon, and it might be, but we had similar problems with an opossum. He would pop through a small, very small, uneven spot in our coop and eat the chicken feed and the eggs. We never knew about the spot because it was so small. And when we stopped getting as many eggs as we used we started looking around and found the hole. When we went to investigate we found egg shells in the old playhouse behind the coop. When we went in the yard one night to check on them we seen the feed container swinging and the wind wasnt blowing their was an opossum in it. When we finally caught him, he had egg yolk on his face.

 

[ShrekDawg]

Although I feel like they could also lay eggs in the woods

I know it seems like a raccoon, and it might be, but we had similar problems with an opossum. He would pop through a small, very small, uneven spot in our coop and eat the chicken feed and the eggs. We never knew about the spot because it was so small. And when we stopped getting as many eggs as we used we started looking around and found the hole. When we went to investigate we found egg shells in the old playhouse behind the coop. When we went in the yard one night to check on them we seen the feed container swinging and the wind wasnt blowing their was an opossum in it. When we finally caught him, he had egg yolk on his face.

Thank you!! This is very helpful!! Looking up tracks, it does sort of look like that!! And we do have opossums around. I really need to set up the game camera and maybe a trap or two. Forgot to set the cameras up tonight.

I’ll try to do it tomorrow maybe and move all the hiding places too aha

 

[Beer can]

Coons are pretty smart, and have good hands that can unlock latches. If it is a coon just eating eggs it might most likely graduate to eating chickens. I had one that did killed one of my best JG hens.
Set a havaheart trap, it was reaching in and taking the bait, that and dragging the trap out through the woods, setting it off and just stealing the bait. I put boards on the sides and a big rock on top and got the sucker.