What took my chickens?

[Matzwd]

So sorry! It sounds like it must have been a horrible ordeal for the chickens and ducks.

 

[cmom]

Recently I lost my precious Gladys while free ranging to a fox and just prior I lost a couple of other birds. I hadn't lost a bird to a predator in several years. I do blame myself for loosing Gladys but not the other two because they were locked in their coop and pen. Somehow a gate was opened. When I discovered that two birds were missing and then found the piles of feathers, I wired the gates shut. I have a piece of wire on the inside on the gate that was opened and the gate opens out so the wire is always on the inside of the gate. Well the next morning I discovered the gate had been messed with again and somehow the wire that was on the inside of the gate was now on the outside of it. The predator had to put a good force to the gate to get it past the wire. I had been seeing a fox lurking around that coop and pen on a game camera. Unfortunately the nights in question it was foggy so I couldn't see the gate but the fox did get close enough to the camera that I saw it. I have been seeing it quite a bit.

 

[Sundevill11]

Today one of our hens is missing. A slew of feathers were found around the coop and no sign of her body. We are totally fenced with no signs of a breach. This happened during the day. Is it safe to assume a hawk got her? Or, at random a bobcat?

 

[cmom]

If you have a game camera put it up. Most likely the predator has been lurking looking for an opportunity when you least expect it. When I first put up my cameras, I was surprised at the predators that roam here especially at night. Good luck...