Woke up this morning to 3 out of 5 chickens dead

[ehoneybee]

I moved Speckle and she has no marks on her at all. Could she have died from fright? BTW, she is the light brown one in my profile pic and my last remaining original hen from when I started keeping chickens almost 2 years ago. She was a good layer and very friendly. She will be very missed.

 

[JBG acres]

So sorry about your loss . I hope you catch whatever it is. If it is a raccoon don't release it anywhere close if you release it. It will come back. I would guess the same with other predators as well. I hope your other hens recover .

 

[Elflady]

Sorry for your loss.

 

[danceswithronin]

So sorry about your hens, that's terrible.

 

[Anime2lover]

Sorry to hear that.

 

[NightingaleJen]

This sounds just awful for you--I'm very sorry.

 

[cmom]

I have game cameras up in different places on my property. Primarily at night I see predators roaming on our property. This camera is pointed at one end of the coops. This is a coyote. That is how I discovered an owl killing some of my birds before I put heavy duty netting over the tops of all of the pens.

 

[ehoneybee]

I have game cameras up in different places on my property. Primarily at night I see predators roaming on our property. This camera is pointed at one end of the coops. This is a coyote. That is how I discovered an owl killing some of my birds before I put heavy duty netting over the tops of all of the pens.
View attachment 1770036

Does a light go on when there's movement? The coyote is looking right at he camera! DH and I were discussing our next move and I suggested adding w motion light back there but he said it won't work in the long run because they'll figure out it's not a threat. I suspect whatever it is climbed up the side of the run and jumped on the mend as they were roosting on their coop. I bet it didn't even see there was netting there. Still don't know what it could be but has to he a flying or climbing animal (so not a fox or coyote). We also just found out that a skunk was found eating eggs when we were away on vacation a few weeks ago but the caretakers didn't tell us! If we had known that, we would've shored up the run :/. On the bright side, my friend has a few hens she is willing to part with and one of them looks like the one we lost and the other 2 look like some girls in our flock that died (one by hawk, one just died somehow). Still trying to figure out how the 2 hens left died. One had no marks on her at all, didn't even have feathers all over the run like the other 2) and the other looked like she had a superficial (but bloody) head wound, and had blood on her beak but no obvious lethal injuries. She finally succumbed to her injuries over night and was found dead this morning. Was hoping she'd rally :/

 

[cmom]

I tried motion lights and they didn't work. Your hubby is correct they do get used to the lights. I had an owl kill several of my birds. That is why I put netting up covering all of the pens. Most nights I see critters on at least one of my cameras and often times on more than one camera. It was surprising of the number of predators that come onto the property mostly at night.

A fox.

A coon.

We live on a dead end road and there is a right of way along the fence line and I see mostly coyotes and some fox using it like a highway.

 

[AngieMaesChix]

Wow I so wanna get some game cams so I can see what exactly does like to roam out property...I see lots of deer n coon tracks down on the river bank which we live right on...no signs of coyote yet but I know their out there...definitely have our share of eagles and hawks also possums and mink but haven’t seen any or tracks...good thing is alltracks are down at water haven’t seen any around coop or barn and it’s been raining and I been looking...just moved here in January first flocks and animals this year here...I love it I’m finally out in the sticks