Starting to really hate feral cats!!!

[mechanic57]

Are cats able to drag off a hen? I lost a bird this weekend and I can't find 1 feather. It's completely gone. Im thinking something took it during the day while they were free ranging. I live in the woods with 36 acres behind us and 80 across the road. I see lots of cats around because the old lady down the road keeps feeding them.

 

[Jesusfreak101]

Yes they can the only thing left of this hen was feathers (only means the cat took its time and killed the hen before running off) i had hens that have been taken with out feathers left by cats those we chased the cat down for and got the hens back alive. It just means if it was a cat it grabbed a meal and ran instead of killing her before leaving.

 

[Jesusfreak101]

The hen they took was a six pound full sized hen. Black sex link they also taken leghorns and other full sized breed including a Delaware hen.

 

[mechanic57]

It was a white leghorn that i lost. I looked around and never found the bird so I can't confirm it was a cat, but I haven't seen anything else around that I would suspect could take a bird with leaving a trace besides an owl, hawk, or human.

 

[Jesusfreak101]

Yeah it could have very well been a cat. I am sorry for your lost hen that not fun at all.

 

[MeepBeep]

Are cats able to drag off a hen?

Domestic cats can kill/drag off prey of about equal size to them if it comes down to that, so yeah feral cats can kill and drag away a full sized chicken, even though they generally prefer smaller easier prey and generally avoid adult chickens...

 

[mechanic57]

Thanks for the info. Just makes it hard to know what kind of predator to try to look out for when I can't find the bird to see what may have killed it.

 

[Jesusfreak101]

Yeah it does. The only way i know for a fact it was a cat beside seeing a cat the previous day was there were cat prints everywhere the feathers were leading out of the yard were my cats dont go. It helped we had lots of rain so the ground was still wet and made great prints.

 

[bobbi-j]

It was a white leghorn that i lost. I looked around and never found the bird so I can't confirm it was a cat, but I haven't seen anything else around that I would suspect could take a bird with leaving a trace besides an owl, hawk, or human.

You might be surprised at what's lurking in your woods. It could also have been a fox, coyote, or stray dog.

 

[Blooie]

You might be surprised at what's lurking in your woods. It could also have been a fox, coyote, or stray dog.

Agreed. I have seen an entire family of raccoons come up out of a storm drain - in downtown Denver, of all places! So predators lurk everywhere and are usually most successful when we don't even suspect they are there! That said, I have had cats deliberately stalking my young chickens when they were out in my yard. They have learned that they can't get into my coop or run, but like all predators they are opportunists and will take what they can catch.