Massacre in Chicken Coop

[Nyboy]

I went out to feed my hens this morning and found them all dead. Only one was eaten the others killed for sport. I am sure it was the raccoon I saw a few times. The killer climbed to roof of pen and ripped out the nails holding hardwarecloth to 2 by 4s. I was sure nothing could get in, my pen was on blacktop so nothing could dig in. I had read not to use staples but nails on hardwarecloth. Raccoon was much stronger then I thought and my hens paid the price. I am still in shock finding them. If he killed one and ate it I could understand, but he killed 5 others for fun. My head is spining, not sure what I am going to do about raccoon. My hens where pets that should of had long lives.

 

[canesisters]

Oh no! I am so sorry!

 

[so lucky]

Oh man, that is so hard to deal with. I am so sorry!

 

[Carol Dee]

Ugh, that makes me sick. So Sorry. If you do not have the heart to OFF the racoon. Hire someone to get rid of it. Wether you live trap and relocate or shoot it. Good Luck getting rid of the varmit. Which has to be done before you bring home anymore hens. 'cause he will be back. Again, so sorry for your loss.

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

sorry to hear about that NYboy. i had that happen a few years ago but i only lost 6 girls, one surviving a direct attack with damage to her neck and pulled wing, and the remaining 10 or so showing just a little bit of shock. i was so worried over the other girls that they got moved into their winter coop in my garage for a week till we came up with a solution to the old coop. i cried to my dad and he came running over to help me secure the area we think it got through. i didn't have any more issues with it getting in. raccoons are nasty buggers when they find a way into a coop.

now that i'm at this new/older house i noticed my ash bucket i put outside and forgot to put a lid on had raccoon prints on the outside a week ago. i had thrown a small koi fish in the bucket and think that attracted it. i'm just hoping it doesn't attempt to get into my coop now. when we build our new one it was to be sure it was like Fort Knox and no predator could get into this one. but i do worry about the pop door which swings into the house and has a slide lock. i'm sure if a raccoon can put enough force on the door it could push it in eventually. i've also noticed some gnawing on part of the run fence recently and pushing along the fence near the bottom of the coop. i have to re-secure those areas.

 

[dewdropsinwv]

So sorry Nyboy about the chickens!!!! That is terrible. I live in the country so I also worry about raccoons!

 

[digitS']

My problem years ago was a coyote.

The dogs were afraid of him, as they had good reason to be. He (or, they) beat up the neighbor's male dog and nearly killed him. He was a collie/St. Bernard cross. My girl dogs didn't want to leave the house when they thought the coyote was around.

I first became aware of him when something climbed the fence and caught my little bantam rooster Cecil in the henyard with his 1 girl friend, Least Chicken. He eviscerated them but I arrived before he could enjoy his meal.

I spent that night with a gun in my cellar, which was under the woodshed and next door to the chicken coop. It counted for nothing. I couldn't see a thing on that moonless night and the coyote might not have even been around. A couple days later, I caught him in the hay field about a 100 yards away. That dang 303 that I could never hit anything with, proved useless! Broadside.

He really discouraged me from having roosters. They seemed to serve no good purpose other than sacrificing themselves. That idiot Easter Egger led his hens out into the trees about a week later. I found plenty of feathers but 2 birds went missing!

Then, he made the mistake of showing up at daybreak and laying in wait behind the barn. Ignoring the bigger rifle, I used the 22 I'd learned to shoot as a kid.

Steve

 

[MontyJ]

That's horrible news! I'm really sorry! Raccoons are incredibly strong, intelligent, and determined creatures. It may sound brutal to some, but I am not of the catch and release crowd. Releasing it just makes it a problem for someone else. If I can't get a shot on it, I'll trap it and kill it.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Thats hard. Thats really hard. I feel for you.

It is hard to build a truly predator proof coop and even harder to build a predator proof run. All it takes is one weakness. They are pretty good at finding and exploiting any weakness they find. To make it even harder, you might go years without any problems then you get hit overnight.

Its certainly not fool-proof, but the way I attach hardware cloth is to use lathing where I can. On round fence posts where I cant use lathing I use large heavy fencing staples and several of them. Make sure you are attaching it to something solid, a 2x4 or better. I rip a 2x4 into strips maybe thick, drill pilot holes so I wont split the wood, and attach that over the edges of the hardware cloth with screws. The screws go in between holes in the hardware cloth. This not only covers the sharp edges of the hardware cloth to keep from snagging your skin and clothes, but it makes it a little harder for the predator to get an edge free to work on. If you want to, you can even put fender washers on those screws so if the predator is strong enough to bust off the lathing the washers might still hold.

Nothing reasonable can stop a bear and some male raccoons may reach 40 pounds. They are incredibly strong. Im certainly not going to say my method will stop any predator but I think it gives you a pretty good chance.

How you handle it is your business but I would never catch and release. Its not like they are endangered. To start with, its probably illegal, however important that is to you. I wouldnt want to release a trap-smart animal where it becomes someone elses problem. There are other reasons but thats my main one.

Take some time to get over your shock and anger before you make any decisions. You are in a hard place.

Eliminating one raccoon will not totally solve the problem. If there is one, there are more. But raccoons are territorial. Other than mating season Im not talking about a raccoon defending a certain territory from others, but that they hunt the same territory over and over. If you remove one, you are removing one that hunts your territory. There may be another one also hunting your property but at least there will be one less.

Ill also mention that chickens are not the only thing they eat. The will totally destroy corn if they find it. Recently I had one climb up in a plum tree and eat the few plums that survived my May snow. The first raccoon I removed after I moved here was because he was eating my blackberries just as they were starting to get ripe.

Many people would be amazed at how many predators there are in suburbia. A chat with local animal control on what animals they have to deal with might be enlightening. In Metairie, the raccoons use the storm sewers as highways to safely get form dens to feeding grounds.

 

[catjac1975]

Raccoons are the worst and do kill for sport. My first hens were also massacred by raccoons. They smashed through glass repurposed doors to get them. I caught one still in the coup and saved 3 hens. I shot at the raccoon with a BB gun at point blank range and it did not even flinch or move. I might even have shot it for real if I had a real gun. So sorry. They need to be locked into a wooden chicken house at night. My husband caught and killed many raccoons, reducing the local animals. They had been very over populated. Now that we have had rabies in the area and lots of coyotes there are not many around. We lock the chickens in every night and have had good luck with that. We lost one beautiful young rooster that was going to be used for breeding. It was killed during the day which we attribute to a hawk. So sorry I'm sure it was a terrible sight.