We bought 4 peachicks and 8 keets on Saturday. They've been doing great. We've also had a problem with snakes this summer. As of today, I think we've killed close to 20 rat snakes. All of them have been at least 5 feet long. I had placed the babies in our dogroom/chicken room off of our garage. It has house many chickens, even turkey poults, so I believed it to be safe. I housed the babies in a rubbermaid tub with a metal shelf (one of those utilitarian shelves). It was about 1/2" too narrow to completely cover the tub. But, I thought it would be okay. This morning I came in the room to find it moved and a peachick out of the tub. I looked in and saw a dead keet, 2 peachicks and 4 live keets. So, I had to find 1 peachick/3 keets. We had a lot of feed bags stored in there as well as some cages/tubs etc. I moved most of those out and then I saw the snake. I thought it was a rattlesnake, even though all of the snakes we've found have been rat snakes. Needless to say, it must have eaten the babies. I could find no sign of them anywhere in the room. So, I brought the rest into our bathroom and will raise them inside until we can makes sure that room is secure. It has a dog door on it that was damaged, but we had something in front of it, but there was apparently enough room for the snake to get in. That also means its possible one of the babies might have got out too, but I haven't seen any sign of it. Does anyone have a remedy to get rid of snakes that will not hurt chickens. We usually find them in the chicken house, or the yard. This was a little close because it means they could come in the house.
