I was thumbing through the newest edition of Backyard poultry, online......this is a great piece of information, from someone that has been raiseing chickens 40 plus years.. http://www.backyardpoultrymag.com/issues/2/2-4/Gail_Damerow.html
Thanks for the link - very interesting! Although we live in a residential area, we are bordered on three sides by enough woods to have owls, foxes, deer, possums, racoons and skunks... oh and rats that like to dig under my concrete building and dine on the doggy leftovers.
Thanks Deb for sharing this, yes its a great article. Even though in Australia we dont have the same predators, except for rats, hawks,eagles, snakes. it was a really good read. I used to have the author's book "the chicken health handbook" which is really amazing. I gave it to a friend. Helen
Hm. I wonder if instead of a coon, maybe an owl killed my chicken---and that's why I can't get anything in my trap!
I lost a bantam to an owl! 99% sure anyway. she was roosting on a box in a shed which wasnt protected! I didnt do a head count that night and left her out of the coop. Next morning I found feathers and a wing. The next night I was outside on a foggy night and I saw this massive owl fly in to the shed, he had a wingspan of about 2 feet or more. So I guess it was him,more than likely.
I certainly wouldn't take that article as gospel. Among other things, he/she/it claims minks carry off whole chickens, and that domestic cats will eat an entire chicken as a single meal, leaving only the wings. That's some remarkably big minks and cats!