Mysterious Disaster

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Mysterious Disaster
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Bungo

Joined: 21 Dec 2011
Posts: 354
Location: Wye Valley

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 6:03 am Post subject: Mysterious Disaster

Woke up at 4am this morning to a strange noise coming from the front garden,I am extra mad with myself as I lay listening to it for about 5 minutes before I went to investigate. I thought it was our cat making weird mewing sounds.In a small pen on the front lawn there were 22 five week old chicks which were only on there 4th nigh outside.Now there are only six

There was a small hole dug into the pen .It is way too small to be the work of a fox.The six remaining chicks were huddled in the corner,with one dead chick at the other end with a leg missing , but the other 15 chicks there was not a trace of ,no feathers or sign of a struggle. A mink or polecat come to mind as a possible culprit

.
I have had a bit of a scout round , but can see no evidence like trails of feathers going under fences etc. I was kind of hoping maybe some of the chicks had got out through the hole and run for cover , but no luck on that one.
Its the third batch of chicks this year to go in the pen which I use as a nursery for them for their first couple of weeks outside, and there have never been problems before with predators. There was another pen with nine week old birds a couple of yards away ,and they were ignored.
I have a fox trap , and I will set it by the pen tonight, but I think the culprit is too small to probably set the trap off

Green Rosie

Joined: 13 May 2007
Posts: 10498
Location: Calvados, France

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 6:07 am Post subject:
So sorry to read this - weasel or stoat was my first thought

Bungo

Joined: 21 Dec 2011
Posts: 354
Location: Wye Valley

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 6:10 am Post subject:
I am suprised somthing so small could be so greedy

Green Rosie

Joined: 13 May 2007
Posts: 10498
Location: Calvados, France

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 7:26 am Post subject:
Friends over here lost all their adult chickens in a stoat/weasel attack

Bungo

Joined: 21 Dec 2011
Posts: 354
Location: Wye Valley

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 7:31 am Post subject:
Just had a natter with my neighbour who also keeps hens and ducks. He thinks it might be a mink or even an otter. He lost a duck with out a trace, sitting on its eggs a week or so ago , and the other ducks were in the shed at the time , kind of rules out foxes.

Green Rosie

Joined: 13 May 2007
Posts: 10498
Location: Calvados, France

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 7:33 am Post subject:
It would be nice to have an otter locally but not if it is taking your chicks. Mink is another story altogether though

Woodburner

Joined: 28 Apr 2006
Posts: 2904
Location: Essex

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 7:42 am Post subject:

Oh bu**er!!

Taken away suggests stoat (IIRC) to me. There was a bit about them on some nature prog a while back, and it showed a littlish weasely creature taking bodies back to a hidey hole. Had to lift my jaw off the ground, it was that determined! It'd've taken more than 5 minutes to take away 15 bodies though, so I reckon you only heard the last one or two being taken off.
I'm surprised there's no sign of a trail. Something must have made at least 15 trips to and 15 from the pen. :S

As for ignoring the other pen; why break into a second pen when there's still food in the first, and they may have been too big for it as well anyway.

Still a bu**er!

Barefoot Andrew
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 21 Mar 2007
Posts: 22780
Location: In the 17th century

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 7:56 am Post subject:
Sorry to hear this duff news Bungo A.

Lorrainelovesplants

Joined: 13 Oct 2006
Posts: 6521
Location: Dordogne

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 8:14 am Post subject:
There are a lot of stoats around...I saw a new family out playing nearby just last week, with some young..... Cant you put them in a house at night?

Bungo

Joined: 21 Dec 2011
Posts: 354
Location: Wye Valley

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 8:20 am Post subject:
All chickens will be getting a lock in for the immediate future

Ty Gwyn

Joined: 22 Sep 2010
Posts: 4563
Location: Lampeter

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 8:44 am Post subject:
Dont rule out Rats.

chicken feed

Joined: 27 Aug 2009
Posts: 2677

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 9:01 am Post subject:

Ty Gwyn wrote:

Dont rule out Rats.

i know someone lost a whole hatch to rats.

my money would be a stoat though

T.G

Joined: 13 Sep 2009
Posts: 7280
Location: Somewhere you're not

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 12:31 pm Post subject:

I was about to say rats soon as I read the OP.

We lost chicks to rats last year, even ducklings, in the past they've broken into pens by climbing up the latted boards and pushing the perspex windows in, we know this because one such critter had the spring back action of the perspex pin him in place till morning where we found him, half in half out and we bait regularly.

They come after quail too, we set live traps and we've never caught anything other than rats.

Bungo

Joined: 21 Dec 2011
Posts: 354
Location: Wye Valley

Posted: Tue Jul 03, 12 12:51 pm Post subject:
We do have rats about the place , but the hole was way bigger than a rat would dig, and the dead chick left had a leg missing . The charming rats round here seem to always eat the stomach first or at least they do if they get to a dead rat in a trap before me. Also there was the strange wailing noise that alerted me in the first place.

matt_hooks

Joined: 01 Aug 2010
Posts: 312
Location: Lambourn(ish) Berkshire

Posted: Wed Jul 04, 12 9:26 pm Post subject:
I'd go for mink. Otter is a possibility, but you'd likely see signs of them being around. Do you have any live traps? I use a squirrel trap to great effect with the rats, guess it'd work just as well with mink.

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