2 ms·
Off the top of my head some of the culprits I have caught in the hen house: * Snakes (sometimes, having a snooze still full of young chickens), * Eagles,
by Tsagadai 14y ago
Off the top of my head some of the culprits I have caught in the hen house:
* Snakes (sometimes, having a snooze still full of young chickens),
* Eagles,
* water rats,
* wild dogs,
* foxes,
* feral cats,
* neighbour's dogs,
* pigs,
* kids,
* and others I have probably forgotten.
Needless to say, keeping chickens alive can be a tricky task. Each time it happened the coop was locked. Also, I grew up in country Australia.
- belorn 14y agoAgree. There was a reason why the outside yard of the hen house had a chicken grill around it, including a chicken grill "roof" for the yard. Even then, foxes and eagles ate more hens than we. The hens really like to sneak out of their yard and hen house. Did not have any issues with snakes or water rats (Sweden), but we did have a issue with flooding. With water just a hand deep, one or two would sometimes drown (the rest would either sit on the sitting sticks, or roosting). On a more positive side, I never had any issues with cats (even feral ones from what I remember) or dogs. there are no wild dogs where I lived, but we did operative a store right next to the hen house, and customers dogs (and kids) were often running around.
- belorn 14y agoChicken grill -> chicken wire.