Red Fox Makes Mass Kill

[centrarchid]

This will be elaborated on this evening with pictures. Should be educational. Very heavy rain event knocked out fence.

 

[guineapeeps]

Sorry to hear about your loss......
Ugh..I hate fox! I lost a number of my guineas to them right in broad daylight. They would hide in the cornfield and dart into the yard and grab a guinea right in front of me! I had a hard time eliminating them because they are so sneaky and fast. I ended up leaving a stereo out tuned into talk radio. I put it near where the guineas would hang out and cranked it up all day long. (Luckily I didn't have any neighbors nearby to complain!) This pretty much ended my fox problem. (I didn't see them much during daylight hours after that. I would see them at night, but by that time the guineas were locked in for the night)....I guess they didn't like the noise or the political commentary!

 

[centrarchid]

Pundits best repellent.

 

[centrarchid]

After work / school, kids and I went back to barn. Dogs were really on edge every time the chickens made alarm calls. I policed up another carcass. Of the 20 chicks, 3 have been accounted for an penned, 6 carcasses found where 4 were headless. That means 11 chicks and their mother are not accounted for. I suspect strongly that at least some are still in the high weeds of the poultry yard.

When I encountered this headless chick on path leading to barn I assumed owl but started to waffle on that when seeing a trail of feathers. Chick also small enough for owl to pack off in flight unless dogs flushed it.

This pile of 4, including one with head on, was found in a heavily traveled pathway.

The heavily traveled pathway. Fox did this over night so something is up.

Location were something major happened. Looks almost like a deer bed.

Path used by fox carrying carcasses I did not find in poultry yard. Based on colors of feathers, more than one color type carried through.

Path I could see once fox outside fence. Dog working track that was cold. Fresh, then I could smell it. Red Fox have very strong smell.

 

[CapricornFarm]

We had red foxes in TN that were breeding not 100 feet from our back door. They were very bold, striking in full daylight and carrying off one bird at a time. I gave up free ranging my birds.

 

[The Moonshiner]

Where were your dogs when this killing was going on?

 

[centrarchid]

This thing happens from time to time. You gasp, cuss, think about it, and make adjustments. Short-term adjustment is pulling felled plants off wire to remove shorts. Long-term adjustment will be to make so vegetation is three mower widths instead of two and even more where the bamboo patch is concerned. Twice this year rapid plant growth promoted by ideal rainfall has taken fence out when a storm hits. The foxes are clearly probing all the time. We shall see if fox got a scare by seeing if remaining carcass gets policed up. If no, then dog interrupted action giving fox a good scare. From this point on till next spring, birds will be penned except when I can provide more oversight.

 

[The Moonshiner]

So dogs were not restricted from area of kill at time of kill?
Think we have simular set up as far as size and use dogs in the same way. My area seems big for dogs to have eyes on all areas at all times but they don't seem to miss a lot as far as ground predators.
I often wonder if a fox were to enter fencing if it could get a kill and out without being noticed. They are sly creatures.
Have three dogs and coyotes working properties on two sides of us lately. Dogs been working fence line heavily during nights now.

 

[BaJa]

or the political commentary!

that's a good one!

 

[The Angry Hen]

I hate when the fox attacked. Sorry for your loss. My best trick is lead... Not even one thought. If they are on my property, I shoot them then into the dens then put a log in it. I've only had two Guinea keets killed by a fox- two too many.
The foxes stopped me from free ranging. I wasn't even gone for twenty freaking minutes and it happened.
Sorry for anyone who has ever had this happen to them. It is terrible.