Smart weasel-dumb weasel

[gsim]

Story relayed from predators section.

[URL]https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/uploads/34643_weasel_hunter.jpg[/URL][/img

]Recently a friend of mine, Bob Taylor, sent me an illlustrated story of his encounter with a predator. Seems he went to coop one day to find a dead hen. He spotted a tunnel hole and knew it was a weasel that had gotten in to his dirt floor coop. (This is in the upper peninsula area of Michigan) After filling in the hole, he modified a rat trap adding teeth to it. He baited and set it at the entrance to it's burrow under the same building the coop is in.

Later he went out, the trap had been tripped and the bait was gone. While he was looking at the scene, the weasel stuck it's head out of the hole and looked up at him. My friend went back to the house for more bait and his shotgun. He set the bait close to the hole and waited to one side. In a short while, the weasel went for the bait, and 'pop goes the weasel' or..more like 'boom goes the weasel'.

 

[Nodaksnakelover]

Love the story! thanks! It's scary how unafraid the weasel family can be! years ago my mother in law had a mink raiding her chickens. One day she was in the coop when he made his raid...er...his last raid... She weilded a pitchfork and got him with the first toss of the pitchfork!

 

[CaitlynNichols]

May I borrow your trap for the rodents that live in my attic and love to keep me up late at night?
LOL. We had a weasel problem a year ago, and man I wish I had gotten revenge on that weasel that ate the mother to a batch of chicks that hatched the night she was attacked.

 

[gsim]

Quote:

As my post says, it is not my trap, but belongs to my friend up in Michigan who emailed the account of the whole thing to me, including pics. I would recommend poison inside of a weasel-box. That is effective for mice, rats, and weasels without endangering chooks that could otherwise eat the bait. Anything soaked in antifreeze will kill the buggers too. But you can use a mortar and pestle to grind up some D-con and mixe it with minced liver or other organ meat and put it in the weasel box. You will get them. Rat traps are good too. A small catch-alive trap will also do the job and you can just tie a rope to the trap and drop it in the creek for quiet disposal. Or use a .22 cal pistol or pellet gun to the head.

 

[Firearia]

Glad he was caught! We've had no mink problems around here yet, but I remember when I saw one close to the coop by the fence I raced over to my chickens to 'guard' them.