What killed my chickens?

[Ernest]

I found 8 of my chickens dead this morning. Two had a tiny bit of blood on their necks, but I didn't see blood on the others. Four of them were oustide the chicken coop, but the other four were all over the farm. The other 10 chickens are still okay. I'm not sure what would kill the birds so neatly and why the others weren't killed...Any help would be much appreciated!

 

[Higins00]

Racoons kill mutiple chickens in one night and sometimes don't even eat any of them. They snap their necks or pull their heads off just for fun. I guess after 8 it got bored. Can you lock your chickens up at night? He will come back and finish the rest off.

 

[Ridgerunner]

From what you said, my first thought is a dog. This link might help. It may give you clues of what to look for that you would not think to mention to us.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=18670

Sorry this happened.

 

[HorseFeatherz NV]

I am guessing dogs - they tend to kill and leave.

 

[Ernest]

Thanks for your replies. It may have been dogs, but I don't really live by anyone with dogs, and my dogs are greyhounds so they are never not on a leash or in my fenched in yard...But if dogs did kill them, it would explain why I found dead birds all over the yard.

 

[buff]

Sorry to hear that this happened to you. I have also had mutiple birds killed at one time and found that our neighbors dog was killing our chickens. Sometimes they would just leave them and not much of a mess, other times feathers everywhere, other times they would take them with them. My husband one day was out in the fields planting corn, and there was some of our chickens near where he was, then he saw the neighbors dog, he scared it away for a little bit, but when he was coming back down the path he saw feathers and then saw the dog heading home and found where the dog buried the chicken. The predators I know for sure that I have had, has been the neighbors dog and a coopers hawk(they about the size of a chicken). Coopers hawk kill their prey right where they catch them and eat them right their for they can't fly off with them like red-tail hawk can and they usually only killed one at a time. Our neighbors dog has just killed 4 of my chickens in the last week within two days. He left one at our house, took one home with him, and never found the other two. And I would have to say if you pen your chickens up at night it probably is a dog. Since, that dog killed my chickens in the morning and throughout the day. I use to have a flock of 30 chickens and now I am down to 17 chickens, and I also got 13 buff orpington chicks. And since we have had a talk again with our neighbor about tying up their dog we have lost anymore chickens.

 

[mistyfeather]

i had the same thing happen last night

i gave them treats around 7pm closed them in for the night and when i went to check on them befor going to bed i found all 18 of my babies scattered around the yard

we never even heard a sound . 2 birds are missing and i found one dead in the neighbors yard