What killed Rusty the Rooster?

[robbitybob2000]

He stood a couple of foot high when flapping his wings and strutting his stuff..and had very large spurs, I just can't work it out because there were no feathers around and no obvious damage to his body just a tiny bit of damage on his comb and a nick out of one toe which could have happened afterwards for all I know.

The choices are...
One of my two cats who have been living with him for over a year. I was thinking he may of been sunning himself down the sign of the section...where one of my cats is quite often observing them through their fenced off part of the section...they free range during the day. I have also caught both of the cats on separate occasions in the chicken coop.
Two there is a possum in the area but I think it happened during the day as he was outside the coop...they don't usually budge once they are in the coop up of the ground.
Three apparently there are stoats and the like around and something is digging it's way under the wire netting that is tent pegged to the ground. The enclosure was mainly to train some wild and young hens to lay their eggs in the coop.
Four A stray close to same size rooster that strayed from around the corner...but I would have thought he would have moved in if it was him.
Five Age? Does anyone know how long sex link type roosters live and if he is one...he looked like he had rhode island red blood with a white tail with a little bit of black fleck in it.
Six there is a hawk in the area but he was off to the side of the yard where there are trees bushes on one side and an 6 foot fence on the other side of a 6 foot wide strip?

Other...Anyone have any other ideas...I'm so upset...I suppose I shouldn't get too attached to them but it's a bit late for that!

 

[chooks4life]

How old was he?

It can be hard to see injuries on a bird, it could be any one of the suspects you listed.

I wouldn't think it was the hawk though, you'd see a lot of feathers shed in that case --- most of the time, anyway. Sometimes no feathers are lost.

Also, I wouldn't think it was the cats, it's more likely to be one of the other things you listed.

Best wishes.

 

[NEChickenNoob]

Stoat sounds about right. The kill you describe reminds me of a weasel kill. A local around here described a Fisher kill to me and showed some pictures. Often weasels will kill just to kill.

 

[Nocila]

I've had a few run ins with weasels, and we lost 17 birds in one night. When we found the birds, they were, for the most part, piled up, and there were no obvious signs of injury. The only thing that doesn't really check out with the killer being a weasel, is the fact that only one bird was killed, as they tend to get bloodthirsty...

 

[chooks4life]

X2 what the other two said, personally I'm betting on the weasel.

About them being bloodthirsty, Nocila, I have read they actually drink blood, so while they are known to just go on killing sprees, perhaps this one was just after a good sip and got what it needed from the rooster. They act different depending on their breeding cycle too. I've read that females building up larders for their breeding season will kill nonstop all day long if they find a big enough prey source, whereas normally they will stop with one if it's just for food.

Best wishes.

 

[Nocila]

Oh interesting, I had also heard they drink blood, though I had trouble verifying that, but I've never had them stop with just one, they've always taken five or more, so I always assumed that, once they started, it was hard for them to stop.

 

[chooks4life]

Oh interesting, I had also heard they drink blood, though I had trouble verifying that, but I've never had them stop with just one, they've always taken five or more, so I always assumed that, once they started, it was hard for them to stop.

X2 on the hard to verify, lol! Until recently I thought maybe it was an old folklore myth. I came across an authoritative source on mustelids saying they would sometimes just sip blood and not eat the meat, and what with blood being a liquid tissue and very high in nutrient levels it does make sense. This was called 'spring-time' feeding because they didn't need to store the bodies.

I also read a study where a female found a colony of mice and spent the next day just killing and storing them in her burrow, she killed over 30 of them in one day and saved each corpse, in this case for winter coming.

It's a strong instinct and it most likely would be hard for them to stop, and possibly even dangerous, because I know my poultry will hunt and kill and eat small animals, like rats etc if they get the chance. Any rat like animal that stopped long enough would be bashed to death by them. Sometimes my poultry would form a group around something dangerous like it hypnotized them. On one of the very rare occasions a python did get some of my poultry, the surviving mother and chicks were drawn to keep attacking it, even though it was huge and not the size of snake they could kill or eat. I didn't see it under the hay until the hen kept provoking it to lunge at her. This is, I think, why pythons will sometimes massacre many more birds than they can eat. If you get into a den and kill some, it makes sense to kill the rest lest they kill you, even more so in the case of a reptile which can't easily move when full so has the option of either killing more, or relinquishing its meal and escaping. Not the same thing as killing for the fun of it in this case but definitely doesn't fit under the maxim of 'animals only kill what they can eat'.

I'd guess with weasels and chickens they can't easily remove them from the cage as they can't fit the larger bodies out where they got in, so they leave many wasted kills. In cases where the animals weren't in a cage, well, I don't really believe the idea that all animals won't kill for fun, because really it's just good practice for a predator to keep its skills keen, and I do think there is some sort of enjoyment of it, because it's a life-preserving skill for them to be able to hunt prey and when animals do something that benefits them there are rewards both hormonal and in other areas like nutritional which reinforce the beneficial behavior. Positive rewards, i.e. enjoyable ones. Obviously it's not negative reinforcement, lol. But it's not a nice idea to think of a predator animal enjoying itself making a mess of your stock... But, after all they are just doing what comes natural to them.

Best wishes.

 

[Nocila]

Thanks for the information!

 

[greenfield]

Don't think it was a possum, I have seen one kill a chicken and just eat what is in the crop. Then used the carcass as bait in a bob cat trap. In our area any chicken that disappears without a trace has been carried off by a bob cat. I had two rooster fight and the older one ended up with a damaged comb and a broken off spur. Those are the only facts I can offer.

 

[laurelandcheryl]

I don't think it was the cats, the possum, the other rooster ( the stray ) or the hawk. How old was he ( though I doubt it was age )?

Also I had two of my chickens killed by a hawk and there were feathers everywhere. It probably isn't the hawk.