trouble with snakes eating eggs

[dacjohns]

Quote:

That's what I get for reading too fast. Sorry.

 

[jdypat]

I would not kill any type of snake if it was not in my way.. when it crosses my way my house my yard my hen house my comfort zone, I will do my best to re route it and leave it be. remembre that sweet snake people... but i have a great dove aviary in my yard, near my chicken house..and ive noticed the sudden lack of eggs in the aviary.. the slacking off of egg production in the hen house..and then i found a black chicken rat snake in a nest and I captured him and released him far from home.. see ewww now i know.
ok now are there more in my personal space..yes im sure of it..so i took a beautiful egg and sacfriced it for prosterity.. I gently cut a slice into the egg and placed a razor blade into it.. and sealed it with scotch tape.. i put it in a nest that is blocked from chickens and Im waiting.. i know this will work.. Im sorry I really am.. but his personal space ends at the exact spot where mine starts..
jdypat

 

[dogzrule5]

I have a terrible problem with mice and black snakes in my barn! I spent all weekend making improvements and got four snakes out of the barn - two were huge!!! There is still one in there (that I know of), but right now I'm sick of dealing with them.

I know they're after the mice and eggs. I gather the eggs every day, but Saturday morning I was surprised when I saw not one, but two black snakes together going after one egg. It was definitely a gross site but I managed to get one of them out of the barn. The other one is still in there somewhere.

I'm going to try some of the Bonide products - the Mouse Magic to get rid of the zillion mice, and their snake repellant. Problem is, I've made my little barn so tight, that whatever is in there can't get out. I watched both mice and a snake try to get out but I've got hardware cloth all around the base of the barn and all the snake could do was crawl around trapped. I'm not quite sure how to deal with the remaining culprit.

And I saw one of the big snakes I threw out of the barn Saturday go back in through the open door. I got it back out and immediately built a screen door out of hardware cloth. Well, not immediately. It took the whole afternoon!

 

[City Chicken Lady]

When I see a snake in my nest box with an egg in its throat (last week) it is obviously a problem for me. I was wondering why I wasn't getting many eggs anymore. When I found what I think was the same snake inside my chicken coop and run which is 99.9% covered in hardware cloth with what looked like four or five eggs inside its body, I decided enough was enough. I called a friend nearby who got rid of the snake for me. This is what the snake looked like, black and grey/light cream. I only have twelve chickens so I appreciate every egg I get.

http://www.dcnr.state.al.us/watchable-wildlife/what/Reptiles/Snakes/ratsnake.cfm

 

[chinzilla]

Sooooooooooo this thread has a lot of information about the different kind of snakes and whether or not to kill them - but no actual suggestions aside from shooting them to get rid of them?

I've discovered a MASSIVE 6 ft long black rat snake has been eating my Peepers eggs! NO EGGS now for over two weeks!

We have ridiculous landscaping as my hubby is a landscaper, so there are plenty of places for this jerk snake to hide - and I'm sure he's snagging the eggs right after they are laid... which I am still unsure of the exact time Peep lays her eggs (I think between 3 and 4 pm but can't be sure) and this snake does NOT hunt at night but during the day, so simply "closing the coop" doesn't apply... and they climb UP and through small holes so unless I boxed them in an airtight container, no dice on that working either.

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALP! I want my eggggggs!

 

[amenfarm]

You can use wildlife netting around your coop. Just roll it it loose and drape it around the coop area, anchoring it here and there. when the snake slides through and it's rolled it can't escape the rolls of netting and can't back out because their scales catch.There is a picture of someones coop on the site with a dead rat snake that could not find it's way through the netting. Geese will kill/ eat snakes, a line of moth balls will deterred--but they are poisons themselves so out of reach of Little ones and dogs (yes, my passed away golden ate moth balls and like to have died).

 

[zazouse]

This king snake got caught in some netting i had in the trash barrel, it was very hard to get it out , i had to use little bitty sissors to cut it free.

 

[DianaMallory]

Well sounds like to me that you guys with snake problems need to get with the people that are having rat problems and work together! lol! I never kill snakes unless they are venomous! They are what controls the mice and rat population! And yet another reason why not to free range your chickens!

 

[marthas_ear]

The rat snakes we have had in our hens' nest outside of Austin come in broad daylight when the coop is open.
One came regularly at the time the nest would be full of eggs in the early afternoon.
Scared the hens so they started laying on the floor of the coop and in very odd places.
We have had 2 rat snakes- one ate chicks and the other cost us about 3-4 weeks worth of eggs.
I shoo-ed one away with ice cold water, thinking that would keep it away, but the next time, it didn't even leave the nest when splashed.
The state herp says that golf balls and fake eggs are cruel and inhumane ways to control snakes.

If it is a problem, then I believe a blow to the head that kills the brain is the most humane way to solve the problem.
Relocating it just makes it someone else's problem...

 

[marthas_ear]

fake eggs and golf balls are a cruel slow death for snakes...inhumane.
Hit them on the head if you want to kill them to kill the brain as a decapitated snake head will live on for hours...that is cruel.