Tired of feeding freeloaders

[redinator]

Your link for the "treadle feeder" seems to be the same high leg port feeder, but, knowing the competition that is sold on Amazon it is likely one of the Chinese made feeders like the Grandpa or one of its many clones. They are NOT rodent proof, reading their negative reviews shows that. They could sometimes work IF you didn't have to block the feeder open for three weeks to train the chickens. Getting your bluff in is good enough some times. That said, leaving the feeder open for three weeks is NOT for training, it is for limiting the number of product returns.

If one offered a money back guarantee for two years you better have a perfect product that can just be dumped out of the box and tossed into the coop and work 100% of the time and not fail, ever. One return, which shouldn't be resold due to disease, plus the shipping both ways and the cost of Amazon processing the return, will wipe out the profit from the next ten to fifteen feeders. Grandpa gets by, according to online reviews, by offering a two year guarantee then usually not honoring it. With enough advertising from websites earning the Amazon commission that is a viable marketing method if your morals are not conflicting with your actions.

Amazon though, the return period is only 30 days. Telling people to leave the feeder blocked open in various amounts for three weeks burns up 75% of the return window. People being people means that most are decent sorts and will blame themselves for the failings and either keep plugging away or burn up the last week reaching out for help and accepting that help from the seller to attempt to fix the failings.

Window is closed, no return. Trying to back-charge on the credit card just puts a mark on your credit history and leads to Amazon firing you as a customer.

Sorry for the rant... back to what you asked.

You will not find a ratproof treadle feeder on Amazon. The cost of selling there, subsidizing the shipping, shipping product around the country to try to cut shipping costs costs almost as much as just shipping from one point in the center of the country. Add the returns wiping out a huge chunk of your profit. The only items that survive on Amazon are those with huge profit margins. Think three to four times the selling price. Now you can grind out a 5 to 10% profit at the end of the year which is average for a lot of industries.

Now, some of these feeders are poor designs but MIGHT work if you didn't follow the self serving instructions on training. Get the bluff in and hope the rodents move on for easier pickings.

But, to stop rodent you need:

A narrow and distant treadle, not a huge honking wide platform they can gang up on.
A spring loaded door that increases the pressure the wider the door opens, with a good amount of pre load on the door to prevent a rat from just pushing the door open. A half pound up will work for new rat infestations.
The door HAS to open inward, not up and down, so as to trap the rats if they manage to gang up on the treadle or simply push the door open. Once a feeder has smothered a few dozen rats they will not touch the feeder again until a new population moves in that doesn't have that institutional knowledge from the old colony.
The spring tension needs to be adjustable to allow for increased tension if you are trying to wipe out a bad rat colony but to back off on the tension once the colony is gone to allow the smaller birds or breeds to feed by themselves.

And you have to be willing to follow the darned instructions to the very letter, nothing added, nothing left out, and ask for help if you aren't sure how to interpret the instructions.

On to squirrels. They are three times harder to stop but the same features with an increased door tension, say four to five pounds, will stop them. Next to a big woods and the squirrels share the chicken coop territory? Get ready to dump the feed into a barrel and drown the trapped squirrels because you won't stop three to four squirrels cooperating. The feeder has a cleat, lift it off, dump the feed into a box or barrel, the squirrels cannot get through the narrow throat of the feeder. Set the feeder in a barrel of water and wait one hour to be sure they aren't just stunned. I'd set them on fire with gasoline just to be sure LOL. You eventually will run out of enough squirrels that there aren't enough to gang up.

Or, if you have a breed that is five to eight pounds, crank down the door spring tension until they cannot get in and keep spare springs on hand.

Spicing up the food, it has been tried with rats in scientific studies. Works for a few days if there is no other feed available or it slows down the feed theft, then it climbs back up to normal as the rats get used to the taste and then the feed theft increases to over the plain feed as the rats have learned to like the extra spice.

Does it work for squirrels? Don't know, highly unlikely. What I do know is that the dose rate in those studies was so high that you would double the cost of the feed after adding cayenne pepper.

Thank you The Moonshiner for pointing out the post.

https://a.co/d/1iR23oo Here's the correct link, I must have copied the same one twice by accident. It doesn't have any tension setting that I remember, but I have bantam and standard sized chickens, if the bantams can operate it, a decent sized squirrel could (and does) too.

I guess the chickens will be getting a good bit of protein when I figure out what type of trap to use that won't trap/harm young chicks that might wander into it. Any suggestions on that?

 

[Al Gerhart]

That link worked. Thank you. Yeah, the majority of the positive reviews were from free products given away in return for reviews and the majority were negative, water leaks, screws falling off, edges so sharp they provide gloves for assembly.... rats and squirrels getting to the feed.

For a feeder to be ratproof it needs two things. 1. a large difference between the weight of a rat and the chicken. 2. a large difference between the reach of the rat and the chicken. Bantams negate both, rats are nearly as long as a bantam and a couple of rats weigh as much as some banties. Better to use a stiff spring setting and let the bantams learn to eat when they can.

Traps, you really cannot out trap rodents. They are smart, they don't mess with things that kill or trap them. Short of fencing out the chicks the trap will get them too. Squirrels are a bit more stupid, they can be trapped but again, you would spend a lot of time dealing with the trapped squirrels and a new population would move right back in if you don't deal with the reason the squirrels are there; a poorly designed feeder.

 

[The Moonshiner]

And just a little . If it gets the chance a trapped squirrel with bite the sh!t out of you. Been there.

 

[redinator]

And just a little . If it gets the chance a trapped squirrel with bite the sh!t out of you. Been there.

I had one has a 'pet' years(ssss) ago, but it was an injured baby and we released it once it was healthy . . . never bit us, but I saw the damage it did to chews and nuts, so I'll take your word for it.

No good deed goes unpunished, I guess, lol.

I have friend that likes to hunt and he complains there aren't any squirrels in his yard. I told him set up a bird feeder, they'll come in from miles around, lol.

 

[redinator]

That link worked. Thank you. Yeah, the majority of the positive reviews were from free products given away in return for reviews and the majority were negative, water leaks, screws falling off, edges so sharp they provide gloves for assembly.... rats and squirrels getting to the feed.

For a feeder to be ratproof it needs two things. 1. a large difference between the weight of a rat and the chicken. 2. a large difference between the reach of the rat and the chicken. Bantams negate both, rats are nearly as long as a bantam and a couple of rats weigh as much as some banties. Better to use a stiff spring setting and let the bantams learn to eat when they can.

Traps, you really cannot out trap rodents. They are smart, they don't mess with things that kill or trap them. Short of fencing out the chicks the trap will get them too. Squirrels are a bit more stupid, they can be trapped but again, you would spend a lot of time dealing with the trapped squirrels and a new population would move right back in if you don't deal with the reason the squirrels are there; a poorly designed feeder.

I have this lid trap I've used for rats/mice https://a.co/d/0i7ZjFB which works great, but I just know chicks would fall in and drown too, so I only use it in places the chicks/chickens don't go.

 

[redinator]

Squirrels are a bit more stupid, they can be trapped but again, you would spend a lot of time dealing with the trapped squirrels and a new population would move right back in if you don't deal with the reason the squirrels are there; a poorly designed feeder.

The squirrels were here before I got chickens. The big beautiful oak trees that give my chickens shade and cover also provide homes, cover and food for the squirrels. It just never occurred to me that they'd be a problem or be heavy enough to operate a treadle feeder.

 

[The Moonshiner]

I had one has a 'pet' years(ssss) ago, but it was an injured baby and we released it once it was healthy . . . never bit us, but I saw the damage it did to chews and nuts, so I'll take your word for it.

No good deed goes unpunished, I guess, lol.

I have friend that likes to hunt and he complains there aren't any squirrels in his yard. I told him set up a bird feeder, they'll come in from miles around, lol.

It wasn't a good deed.
I used to trap rabbits in those old school homemade box traps. I sold them as meat to a family I knew. One day I caught a squirrel but I realized what it was as it had eaten the trigger hole bigger and popped its head out ready to make its escape.
It was winter and I had leather gloves on. Reflex and panic that it was seconds from freedom I reached down and tried to shove its head back in.
Apparently a squirrel has a lot to live for because in a moments time I had him around the neck and he was spinning and knawing. Chewed through the thumb, index finger and in between of my glove then through my flesh all the way around.

 

[redinator]

It wasn't a good deed.
I used to trap rabbits in those old school homemade box traps. I sold them as meat to a family I knew. One day I caught a squirrel but I realized what it was as it had eaten the trigger hole bigger and popped its head out ready to make its escape.
It was winter and I had leather gloves on. Reflex and panic that it was seconds from freedom I reached down and tried to shove its head back in.
Apparently a squirrel has a lot to live for because in a moments time I had him around the neck and he was spinning and knawing. Chewed through the thumb, index finger and in between of my glove then through my flesh all the way around.

Noted: trap then shot to kill.

 

[The Moonshiner]

Noted: trap then shot to kill.

That's how it ended.
I squealed like a school girl yanking my hand back but as I started to look into the hole because I didn't see it I then figured out it was still attached to my hand. Like a cartoon I swung my arm around over my head trying to shake it loose.
It did and flung through the air and landed on the side of a tree. I grabbed up my 410 and shot it. Bad shot and ruined most of the meat so I couldn't even sell it.
It wasn't a good day.

 

[redinator]

That's how it ended.
I squealed like a school girl yanking my hand back but as I started to look into the hole because I didn't see it I then figured out it was still attached to my hand. Like a cartoon I swung my arm around over my head trying to shake it loose.
It did and flung through the air and landed on the side of a tree. I grabbed up my 410 and shot it. Bad shot and ruined most of the meat so I couldn't even sell it.
It wasn't a good day.

I would've swore like a sailor, and waged war on the entire population of squirrels. "I'm gonna get you, ya mama, and all ya kin . .you little . .(not suitable for BYC)"