Will a cat hurt my chickens?

[Mamatomany123]

I do think it will depend on the cat. Mine got too close for comfort and my chickens pecked him. He now sits super still when they're around

 

[KingD]

https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/need-help-with-cat-attacks.1432090/#post-23624966

 

[Kiraeh]

Just to add my cat to the pile, he loves watching chicken tv but has never harmed them. He has chased the chickens a few times when they get out of the fence-- he herds them back in! He's a very good hunter of wild birds so he'd have no trouble taking one of mine down if he seriously wanted to, but he seems to have classified them as 'family'. Very strange. My Silkie flock leader does square up to him and try to fend him off when he comes into the run tho.

 

[howdyitsmia]

My sister has a really friendly stray cat that has been hanging around her house. She doesn’t feed it or anything because she wants it to go away, but I’d love to bring it to mine. Is this a bad idea? I don’t want it to hurt my chickens or anything. Of course I’m gonna feed the kitty so hopefully he won’t be so hungry that he resorts to hunting them. I have three 14 week old chickens that mostly stay in their coop. I normally let them run around in my fenced in backyard for a few hours in the afternoon though.

Y’know I think it depends on the cat. If you are taking the cat into your home a feel like you should see if you can train the cat to leave the chickens alone. If the cat is being fed and taken care of I don’t think it’ll be a huge problem, but it is still an animal. The size of the chickens matters as well I think. Mine hasn’t ever had a major issue with the chickens, but at the beginning we introduced them to each other slowly and sprayed him with water whenever he tried anything funny. Occasionally he still runs through them like a little kid chasing geese still though he hasn’t harmed any of them though, and I’m pretty sure one of them pecked him on the head real good at one point.

 

[docteurshepherd]

Too lazy to read through every reply, I'm assuming the general consensus is.. it depends? Because that's really what it boils down to.. luckily never had any issues as you can see here

 

[Lovem all]

Some cats might. My Sparrow could care less but my Jack will stalk my one chicken while I'm just a few feet away.

 

[Peaches Lee]

I've never had problems with cats and chickens. Even when I have had super naughty hens hide (in the hay loft of all places!) their nests on me and hatch out chicks and had them running around my barn--no problems.

I live on a farm, so naturally, people dump their cats here. So there's always at least 8 cats roaming around. Now, I would never say that something couldn't happen--but a full grown chicken...unlikely. My chickens are so rude, they kick the cats out of the cat food bowls and eat the cat food!

 

[My2butterflies]

Haha, I have a black cat named Salem too He is just a little kitty right now, so he’s in the house for the winter. He and his sister were orphans.

As for cats and chickens.... I haven’t had any problems. We had three full time farm cats and one male that comes and goes. Now we just took on four more from my in-laws farm. All go so far.
Of course my chickens are fenced in so the cats don’t have open access to them. They do however have full access to my guineas and turkeys. Again, no problems with the cats even when the guineas were just 6wks old.
Now the turkeys go around and intimidate the cats so the cats are even more turned off by the presence of the fowl

Not sure if my situation is different because I have 32 fearless guard birds roaming around

 

[Krazikatlady64]

Bless you for taking on the care of the cat. They are hunters and chickens prey. Don't underestimate the strenght and agility of the cat. You can make it work, but must not let your guard down and be diligent in the protection of the flock. Good luck!

 

[Malkaris]

Bless you for taking on the care of the cat. They are hunters and chickens prey. Don't underestimate the strenght and agility of the cat. You can make it work, but must not let your guard down and be diligent in the protection of the flock. Good luck!

True.
Sometimes that can affect things in perhaps unexpected ways: One of my chickens pecked one of the cats (plus the cockerel debacle) so they're nervous around the hens.
But! Cats did take out a weasel where the hens were free-ranging. I've seen 2 weasels in my life here, and one was a baby. I haven't seen one in years before the other day, so I hadn't been really worried about them.