Chicken drama

[Marc St Louis]

My dad kept Chickens when I was young.  One night I got up, for some reason, and went outside for a minute.  I could hear a raucous going on at the coup so I grabbed my .22, I think I had a Browning lever at the time, a flashlight and went to see.  When I got there I saw that a slaughter had been going on.  There were pieces of Chickens lying all over the place.  Some of them had legs torn off, some disemboweled and others just lying there dead.  I shone the light around and saw a rather large Skunk in one corner munching away on another Chicken.  I filled it full of lead.  That was the end of that Skunk but not the end on my dad's troubles with his Chickens.

[BowEd]

We keep around a dozen chickens here.I made a 50' long 8' wide wire covered run for them.We've been predator free.They go into wood floored shed which the door gets shut every evening and opened every morning.
We've got chicken hawks here but no gos hawks.Sparrow hawks and occasional eagle too.One more type of hawk mid sized I'm not sure of.It has a lot of white and black on it's longer tail.Couple different type owls.Great horned and barred.Otters,mink,coyotes,fox,skunk and coon will get our chickens too.There are badgers too but not that many.
I did have to shoot a skunk myself the other day that was in with the cats.More than likely an opposum will get shot sometime this winter too.I hung the skunk up in a tree to air out.No turkey vultures around this time of year.It's rather cold here at this time and hopefully I'll skin him out later and make something out of him.

[upstatenybowyer]

Wow Marc, as I was reading your reply I was expecting coyote, weasel, fox, or maybe even bear, but skunk...  I always knew they were ruthless, but wouldn't have thought they were capable of something like that. 

Ed, I'm thinking I'll do something similar to the run you described when the ground thaws in the spring. How high is the "ceiling"?

[BowEd]

Only around 4 to 4.5 feet Jeff.Plain old chicken wire is enough to deter those hawks.I used thin walled galvanized pipe layed across the width of the run to help hold the chicken wire up better.I'll get a pic.I'm sure there are better ways but this worked for me.We bought posts and wire at farm sales cheaper for the task.

The center run is for the chickens.Run on the right is for Robins' minature pony and a nanny goat and goes out into a small pasture.Run on the left is for her pair of pot bellied pigs.Built the shed too some time ago.

[Marc St Louis]

Wow Marc, as I was reading your reply I was expecting coyote, weasel, fox, or maybe even bear, but skunk...  I always knew they were ruthless, but wouldn't have thought they were capable of something like that. 

Ed, I'm thinking I'll do something similar to the run you described when the ground thaws in the spring. How high is the "ceiling"?

Just to clarify.  The Chickens the Skunk was ripping apart were not adults, more like half grown.  Some of them were still alive even though they had legs missing.  I don't know if it could have done the same damage to an adult bird

[upstatenybowyer]

Thanks for the pic Ed, that's really helpful actually. I've been trying to visualize what I'm gonna do and now I've got a frame of reference. Good thinkin with the bars across the top. 

That makes a bit more sense Marc. Still, I would not have expected a skunk to do something like that. How old were you at the time? Mustn't have been an easy thing to witness as a boy. Sounds like you took care of business though!

[BowEd]

Chickens are nice to have around.Excess eggs for the 2 of us are sold or traded away.Many neighbors have them also.Some do let them run all over the yard but eventually 1 by 1 something will get them out here.Same goes for ducks and geese but we don't have any of those.It's why the small door they go in and out of gets shut every evening,and then opened every morning.With a 3/4" thick treated plywood floor nothing can dig for them either.
The little animal I fear the most is the mink killing the chickens with our creeks around here as they do not hibernate.