Red fox here....how do I get rid of it?

[JRNash]

I haven't had a problem yet with any law enforcement over protecting my livestock. I can't say the same about dealings with neighbors.lol

 

[itsasmallfarm]

i would agree with the electrical fence, for foxes they should work great, i know am planning on getting one soon to protect my flock (but its for coyotes instead of foxes)

 

[dekel18042]

So I posted on Friday and Saturday about my chickens and babies being under attack. Lost 5 babies and their mama and was suspicious of a fox. We have kept the girls locked up tighter since then. Secure run unless we are home and in the vicinity, otherwise contained in a larger run, but not actually secure against predators but keeps them contained for our monitoring etc.

This morning after running errands I let them into the larger run and opened my window so I could hear of any issues while I made lunch for the human kids and I. Not 5 minutes later I heard chickens squawking and all the other songbirds going absolutely crazy. I raced outside and there it was....A RED FOX...in my backyard, just looking back at me. It was coming back I'm sure. We noticed that the neighborhood guinea hens have dwindled from 8 to 4, then my flock, and now a neighborhood cat hasn't been seen for a few days and he always sleeps in my neighbors garage.

So now what to do about a red fox???? I have seen on other posts that they are difficult to trap. Can we just shoot it? We have a pulled wire fence on 3 sides, but our back fence is the really super large gauge cattle fencing with barb wire across the top bc we back up to a pasture where cows graze and it's what the farmer had up as a barrier. I'm sure they can climb even if we put something else on our side, right? I'm saddened bc my flock loves to free range and they are used to having 1.5 acres to thmeselves. Now I won't even let them have the extra space of our insecure run unless I'm working in the yard out back. How long until the fox leaves us alone? What would I need to do to secure the larger run? Still devastated after our losses on Friday and when I saw it today I just felt so worried about them all over again, and was so glad I have been more careful.

Thank goodness my 3.5 year old daughter was able to help me. The baby chicks are 6 weeks old today and haven't really learned to come when called yet or to let us catch them easily (our larger run has some decent foliage that I can't get through easily. I had her stand at the "hatch" door to the secure run and open and close so we could get the babies in, the grown hens aren't a problem for me to get, it was just getting them to all stay in as I corralled everyone. I ended up grabbing a small rake to get the babies out from under the foliage and toward the right direction so my daughter could open the door and let me shooo them in. I felt bad but at least I know my feathers are safe now.

This is the first predator issue we have had after 2.5 years of having chickens.

Most people in our area have poultry of some kind. And sometimes we have predators. If we use traps we catch raccoons and opossums but never the fox we know is the culprit. About the only way to reliably get a fox is to shoot it.