Rat Snakes

[Crazy6]

Holy cow!!!!!

 

[Crazy6]

Sorry for your loss.

Rats eat chicks too.. Ruin homes, undermine foundations, short out wires, spread parasites and disease, etc..

Half inch hardware cloth (properly installed) will exclude most predators.. a highly valued resource, well worth the investment.. when compared to alternatives.

Hope the rest of your babes are safe and continue to thrive!

Is it just me or does it seem to be the worst year yet with snakes. I’ve never seen so many black snakes. I’ve never had to deal with them eating chickens before either. I am going through this and having snake proof everything! Also saw on FB somebody posted this. “This happened to us last year and we checked for bit marks and to see if there was anything wrong with them AND NOTHING this happened for 3 days. We put some babies that we had hacked outside the coop in a regular birdcage and they started going off when we got back there we found a 5ft black snake trying to pull the baby threw the cage. A black snake will try to eat them head first and realize that a chicken is to big and it just suffocates the chicken trying to eat it. No marks and a healthy chicken will die. I think we lost about 12 in 3 days” I’ve lost babies and had a hen dead on some eggs. Now I’m wondering.

 

[EggSighted4Life]

Is it just me or does it seem to be the worst year yet with snakes. I’ve never seen so many black snakes. I’ve never had to deal with them eating chickens before either. I am going through this and having snake proof everything!

Very sorry for your experience.

I'm unable to confirm if it the worst year for snakes, but do believe you. Where I'm at is a bit too cool for most snakes.. seeing only garter type in my current location..

I’ve lost babies and had a hen dead on some eggs. Now I’m wondering.

I think this was yours and not part of the quote..

Hens can pass for many reasons and chicks can too.. so hard to say for sure without a camera, direct observation.. or sometimes possibly a necropsy. But definitely worth considering as a *probable* cause since you're seeing them (coupled with other accounts), and taking action to prevent!

I hope the rest are safe and continue to thrive.

 

[Al Gerhart]

And a rat snake's usual diet is? Anyone...anyone? Bueller? Bueller?

Rodents attract all manner of predators from owls to hawks to snakes of all kinds to coyotes. Once they find the rat colony in a coop they stick around for eggs and chicks. No rat colony, no rat snakes because they are out hustling natural food to kill the hunger pains in their bellies.

Find Howard E.'s posts on rodent control, sanitation, exclusion, elimination in that order if you want to solve the snake problem by dealing with the rat problem.

 

[Captain13]

Well, attached is a picture of my morning surprise. It wasn’t in the coop but I fired he was hunting moles. The problem with catching and moving a rat snake is that strong pest defense they can release. Ughhhh. Anyway, I put him in a bucket and moved him to the backside of the property where he promptly went up a big pine tree.

I can’t attach a photo of the 4 foot Cane Break Rattlesnake my neighbor killed two nights ago next to his house. He thought it was a limb and was about to pick it up. The snake coiled and he had to kill it. I only mention this because this happened at 10:30 at night and the whole thing could have turned out really bad. If you are checking your coop or nesting boxes, be very careful. My neighbor didn’t cut the rattler open but the snake was near the coop and had just eaten something based on the lump behind it’s head. Rat snakes are one thing but rattlesnakes are a whole new ball game.

 

[3KillerBs]

The problem with catching and moving a rat snake is that strong pest defense they can release.

This is one of the two reasons I always handle the rat snakes with gloves.