Very Powerful ,Ate Head and Neck.

[NYboy]

I am in a daze, just lost my first bird. I live in NY right outside the city of White Plains,have everything from coytoes to raccoons. Don't have stray dogs because of coytoes. Something last night ripped coop door off it"s hinges. It killed 1 hen out of 5 eating head and neck only. What ever killed her ,ate her in the coop and left the body.What is that powerfull but only eats a small amount?

 

[Ridgerunner]

You can read this sticky at the top of the Predator section. Not all predators read the book and go by what is standard, but that sure sounds like a raccoon to me.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/18670/poultry-predator-identification

 

[NYboy]

Raccoon was my first thought but are they that powerfull? Srews holding hinges was pulled out of the wood.

 

[Aeropennchick]

Is it possible it was a bear?

 

[NYboy]

Very very rare in 20 years only 2x where bears spotted here. A bear would eat the whole bird rght?

 

[Aeropennchick]

There are a couple of news articles on the web about bears getting in chicken coops but it looks like they did more damage, and left the carcasses strewn about

 

[Egghead_Jr]

Is there claw marks? If it was say a coyote it would have to claw at door edges, there would be a lot of claw marks. The only critter with hands is a raccoon, wouldn't be many scratches.

How long were the screws for hinges? How solid is the wood it was screwed to? Here in northern climates male racoons are easily 30 lbs. That's a powerful animal. The record found in wild is 62 lbs but that's a fluke.

 

[laura877]

We had problems years ago with possum getting into the coop and eating the heads off one chicken after another. I caught it in the act and took care of it.

Recently I saw a possum in our barn right outside was the coop. I couldn't get a hold of a gun without going to the house so it was gone by the time I got back. A few days later we lost another hen that had been sleeping in a tote laying box on the floor of the coop as it was molting real bad. I hadn't closed up the chickens entry door into the coop so it would have been easy for the possum to go in. Its head and neck was gone too.