What could kill and eat 30 chickens in 1 night and not leave a single body.

[KettermanHillCoop]

http://www.newforestexplorersguide.co.uk/wildlife/mammals/foxes/family-life.html

I'm not going to engage in a piss fest with you. I'm relatively new to BYC, but my short experience here has shown me that people share what they know by experience to help others. What one person experiences may well be different than what others experience...but the sharing of those experiences just may help someone. You may link articles from England about animal behavior and whatnot, but not all animals behave the same in every area. A person isn't spreading "lies" because they shared a personal experience with a particular animal in their locale...it's just a different experience.

My heart goes out to the OP and his wife on such a devastating loss and if any of my experience with wildlife can help them in anyway, I feel it's only right to share what I know. I knew nothing of chickens prior to my rescuing my flock but the nice people here certainly helped me.

I will bow out of this thread and wish the OP the best wishes for closure and a new beginning...

 

[EggWalrus]

I'm not going to engage in a piss fest with you. I'm relatively new to BYC, but my short experience here has shown me that people share what they know by experience to help others. What one person experiences may well be different than what others experience...but the sharing of those experiences just may help someone. You may link articles from England about animal behavior and whatnot, but not all animals behave the same in every area. A person isn't spreading "lies" because they shared a personal experience with a particular animal in their locale...it's just a different experience.

My heart goes out to the OP and his wife on such a devastating loss and if any of my experience with wildlife can help them in anyway, I feel it's only right to share what I know. I knew nothing of chickens prior to my rescuing my flock but the nice people here certainly helped me.

I will bow out of this thread and wish the OP the best wishes for closure and a new beginning...

Thanks for sharing your 2 cents with us. Like I said earlier, everyone has knowledge to contribute, and the same kind of animal will behave different depending on locale. Thanks!

 

[Bonniebooboo]

It looks a bit like the bobcat scat we found around our property, but for the seeds. Although if a bobcat ate a rodent that had recently consumed seeds, wouldn't the seeds get into the bobcat scat?

In my case, 1 or 2 juvenile bobcats killed 9 chickens during the course of what I would guess was less than an half an hour, but all 9 carcasses were still in the coop. Given that the attack happened around dawn, and the bodies were still warm when I found them, I think my dogs scared the bobcat(s) away before they could have tried to drag any bodies away or even eat what they had killed.

Good question. Cats, both domestic and wild, don't eat the stomach, or guts of their kill.
They literally bite off the stomach and leave it in a pile on the ground, and go for the heart, lungs, liver, muscle meat. Watch your domestic cat sometime with a mouse or rat, they leave the stomach. They eat the head with the teeth, which is weird to me, but they do that. The big cats go after the best meat and organs first, and try to get their fill. Cougars will try to cover their kill with leaves etc and they will be back for it. Cougars can and will carry off their prey if it isn't too big for them to carry. They will try to drag it to a secure spot if possible and try to cover with leaves,debris,dirt to "hide it".

 

[Sunshine Flock]

One heliport is less than 1/4 mile away across the swamp as the crow flies. Everyday, hundreds of times every day, Apache Gunships fly over head. I'm glad that only 1 week every 2 months do they do any flight training at night for their IFR rating. The Apache isn't nearly as noisy as they used to be now that they have stealth rotors, but there is a Chinook heliport just 2 miles away and when those big bastards fly over, they shake the whole damn house! I used to work out there as a Firearms Instructor and Range Safety Officer and when I used to get off work, I'd drive over and watch the Apaches blow up stuff on the big range. Now I get to see Apaches just 200 ft above my head, but I don't get to see them blowing up tanks, trucks and targets any more.

That would be totally annoying every darn day, but I have to say (from a safe distance all the way in Calleefornya) that it also sounds way hecka cool.

My valley girl slang from the 80s.

A Blackhawk landed right in front of me once, in a rainstorm, and then it took off. Just about the most awesome spectacle ever. I'll never forget how it sounded.

 

[chonsey]

Sorry for your loss! I know it's frustrating, still no answers on mine.

 

[Welshies]

@Welshies coyotes live in packs of 3 to 10. Typically family groups. They will hunt for small prey, eg..mice, rabbits etc, alone or in pairs. They also hunt in packs for larger prey, eg...deer, or if going after a large group of prey, eg, flock of chickens.
I have not read through the entire thread so I am not making any assumptions on what happened. Just explaining coyote packs.
I have a pack of them that run through here every 3 to 4 wks, just part of their territory.

Coyote packs are a common misconception. From spring to fall they run as a family group. In fall the pups branch off on their own. The mates mate for life and so stay together. They hunt and eat pretty much everything- veggies, fruit, berries, small animals, sheep, deer fawns.
You probably have Eastern Coyotes which do operate in packs due to being a hybrid between a wolf and a coyote. Eastern coyotes are quite widespread. Western coyotes, true coyotes, do not operate in packs.

 

[Welshies]

I'm not going to engage in a piss fest with you. I'm relatively new to BYC, but my short experience here has shown me that people share what they know by experience to help others. What one person experiences may well be different than what others experience...but the sharing of those experiences just may help someone. You may link articles from England about animal behavior and whatnot, but not all animals behave the same in every area. A person isn't spreading "lies" because they shared a personal experience with a particular animal in their locale...it's just a different experience.

My heart goes out to the OP and his wife on such a devastating loss and if any of my experience with wildlife can help them in anyway, I feel it's only right to share what I know. I knew nothing of chickens prior to my rescuing my flock but the nice people here certainly helped me.

I will bow out of this thread and wish the OP the best wishes for closure and a new beginning...

Lies? I'm sorry, I never said anyone was wrong...
Also these animals behave the same up here in the Rockies as they do in this England article. Animals adapt and vary, and change their behavior, but not... not so that it's black and white from one country to another.

 

[Bunnylady]

there's no way for a canine to climb chicken wire up nearly 6 ft off the ground

Foxes climb trees, y'know.

I wouldn't be surprised if one could make a run-and-jump to scale a 6' fence.

You said that the blood traces you found looked bright red when you first spotted them, but had darkened by the time you went back and looked again. Blood stays bright red only so long; that tells me the blood was shed a lot nearer to dawn than dusk. Which reminds me of something that happened a number of years ago . . . .

We had chickens free-ranging in the goat pen at the time. At first light one morning, I looked out a back window and saw a fox chasing and killing the chickens that had just come down from roosting. It took a moment for what I was seeing to register, and as it did, the goats came out of the barn. The matriarch, Esme, had an often-demonstrated dislike of all things predator, and the moment she spotted the fox, she went after it. She chased the fox all around the pen; they made about 3 trips around the barn before the fox got enough of a lead on her that it dared to risk slowing down to get through the hole it had dug under the fence.

Esme couldn't have cared less, but I know she saved some chickens' lives that morning. I couldn't possibly have gotten there fast enough to stop the carnage as quickly as she did.

I'm not going to insist that it was a fox, just saying that I don't think you can rule it out. Over the years, I have lost birds to foxes, raccoons, owls, hawks, snakes, a bobcat, dogs, cats, the water trough, and my own electric fence.(There are probably a few other things that could be added to that list that I have forgotten about)

 

[Welshies]

Foxes climb trees, y'know.

I wouldn't be surprised if one could make a run-and-jump to scale a 6' fence.

You said that the blood traces you found looked bright red when you first spotted them, but had darkened by the time you went back and looked again. Blood stays bright red only so long; that tells me the blood was shed a lot nearer to dawn than dusk. Which reminds me of something that happened a number of years ago . . . .

We had chickens free-ranging in the goat pen at the time. At first light one morning, I looked out a back window and saw a fox chasing and killing the chickens that had just come down from roosting. It took a moment for what I was seeing to register, and as it did, the goats came out of the barn. The matriarch, Esme, had an often-demonstrated dislike of all things predator, and the moment she spotted the fox, she went after it. She chased the fox all around the pen; they made about 3 trips around the barn before the fox got enough of a lead on her that it dared to risk slowing down to get through the hole it had dug under the fence.

Esme couldn't have cared less, but I know she saved some chickens' lives that morning. I couldn't possibly have gotten there fast enough to stop the carnage as quickly as she did.

Foxes do climb trees. They can actually partially retract their claws- scientists call them a cross between a cat and a dog, because they have the characteristics of both. They are very cunning... worse than any other predator.

 

[EggWalrus]

Coyote packs are a common misconception. From spring to fall they run as a family group. In fall the pups branch off on their own. The mates mate for life and so stay together. They hunt and eat pretty much everything- veggies, fruit, berries, small animals, sheep, deer fawns.
You probably have Eastern Coyotes which do operate in packs due to being a hybrid between a wolf and a coyote. Eastern coyotes are quite widespread. Western coyotes, true coyotes, do not operate in packs.

Here in Alabama all we have are Eastern Coyotes. I've seen 5-8 adults chase a small deer across a field one winter.