It was a joy to read your thread. So I definitely will come back in 2025.
Thank you for thinking of us. My husband cried for two days straight after Honey's death (and I was away in UAE). We are all good now thankfully.
I'm so sad to read that you've had this attack through an invasion that should never have happenedMy turn to thank everyone who had a kind thought for little Piou-piou. It's not pleasant either to write or to read about one of our chicken's death when it's difficult to cope with, and your support means a lot.
@lightm she certainly had her share of miracles, especially when we locked her up with the fox in the shed.
But this time it was the other way round - bad luck. If it had happened the day before, Merle had called loudly to be let out of the coop to lay very early, and I would have already been there at the time the marten came. And while we usually open our shutters at breakfast to hear better any noise from the coop that's just under our kitchen, we had left them closed that morning due to the wind.
It seems the chickens have come to term with it now, and things are going back to normal, except no one wants to sleep on the roost where Piou-piou had been sleeping with Théo and Merle for many months.
I hope you, and your husband, are also adapting to the house without Honey
Saturday morning, coming back from running I came upon my neighbour Amelia. The marten has killed one of her hens too, on the 26, 4 days after Piou-piou. They are setting a trap for it today. We are both hoping one of us catches it.
I'll try to answer all your points, thank you for taking the time to think this through.
We are almost sure it's a marten because I live next to a wildlife reserve that updates an inventory of species on the territory through their camera observations. There is a known marten presence, but no weasel, or any other mustelidae. What we saw was dark brown tabby and had a white collar.
Wikipedia says beech marten and stone marten can be used for the same animal, Martes foina (which isn't listed in the comparative you sent) but I'm not able to say if that's right : https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beech_marten
I may not have been clear that we are not building a new run, but securing the one we have, which is about 15m2. When that's done, we will secure the wood shed. We need about 50x1 meters of hard cloth mesh. The brands that can be shipped here in a matter of days are all chinese ; i've ordered one of those, with a lower gauge than what we previously had. (I have had bad experiences with chinese mesh in the past, but maybe that was bad luck). French mesh producers don't do that kind of mesh, or in very small pieces. Some sites do ship brands from the NL or Germany, but with the holidays the delay is two to three weeks and we want to start now.
Yes, we might be filling with concrete on top of a mesh apron both on the floor ( there is just one portion, above the terrace wall, where the mesh is not already covered in concrete), and for the roof, underneath the rafter that's holding the polycarbonate sheets. And no, we can't dig or only superficially, but all our poles are already set in concrete.
Théo and Merle are still spending most of the day together but when Merle goes back in the chicken yard, Théo is alone outside. This will likely become a problem. For now, things are getting a little more quiet, with some human intervention at roost time.
It's the end of the year. I'm grateful to everyone who read and comment on this thread. I hope you'll stick around in 2025 !
A few pictures yesterday and today : the run needs securing, and the chickens.
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that's a very impressive count; even the frequently broody Merle delivered a respectable amount, a fair return for all your care and resources (those she was offered and those she stole
) it seems to me.
