What nicked my chickens?

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What nicked my chickens?
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SparklyWellies

Joined: 24 Mar 2005
Posts: 88
Location: Oxfordshire

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 9:22 am Post subject: What nicked my chickens?

We kept 4 chickens quite happily for 2 years. They were free range in our garden. Then, like a cartoon, one disappeared and all that was left was a pile of feathers. The next day another one etc.

I am intrigued to know what nicked them. I don't think it was a fox. Is it a possibility that the Red Kites got 'em due to the lack of carrion round these parts. Or something else.

I'd like to get some more but don't really want to keep them in a shed.

jema
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 28238
Location: escaped from Swindon

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 9:44 am Post subject:
Speaking from pure ignorance but why not a fox? Isn't a fox more likely to remember from night to night where a good meal was to be had?

SparklyWellies

Joined: 24 Mar 2005
Posts: 88
Location: Oxfordshire

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 9:47 am Post subject:
I thought foxes made a hell of a mess and would go for the whole lot at once. It's like they went up in a puff of smoke leaving a few feathers in a neat pile. I'm speaking from ignorance too

jema
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 28238
Location: escaped from Swindon

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 9:59 am Post subject:

SparklyWellies wrote:

I thought foxes made a hell of a mess and would go for the whole lot at once.

It's like they went up in a puff of smoke leaving a few feathers in a neat pile.

I'm speaking from ignorance too

Again total ignorance, but I had heard that they go for the whole lot when the situation is unnatural, e.g. they are in a shed.

judith

Joined: 16 Dec 2004
Posts: 22789
Location: Montgomeryshire

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 10:02 am Post subject:

A fox could be the culprit - I've had one fox attack. He left one corpse, two piles of feathers and one very scared survivor. This was an early morning attack after I forgot to lock them up at night. Haven't made that mistake again

My dog is usually out and about all day, so we don't get daytime visitors.

If the problem is the kites, you could always keep them in a run with bird netting over the top when you are not around. You could then let them free range when you are in the garden.

eva
Guest

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 10:05 am Post subject: chickens
Why couldn't it be foxes i mean it couldn't be anything else could it if u have a dog or something like that it wouldn't be that so it has to be a fox do u agreee

judith

Joined: 16 Dec 2004
Posts: 22789
Location: Montgomeryshire

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 10:33 am Post subject: Re: chickens

eva wrote:

Why couldn't it be foxes i mean it couldn't be anything else could it
if u have a dog or something like that it wouldn't be that so it has to be a fox do u agreee

My money would be on the fox, Eva, but if the number of red kites I saw overhead last time we drove down the M40 is anything to go by, I wouldn't want to rule them out entirely.

SparklyWellies

Joined: 24 Mar 2005
Posts: 88
Location: Oxfordshire

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 10:44 am Post subject:
Wave at me next time Judith! I can see the M40 from my garden and the kites hover over our garden frequently. The only thing is, I didn't think their claws were strong enough to pick up a chicken. But there is talk that because of the lack of carrion, and the successful boost in their numbers, they're having to eat live food.

Treacodactyl
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 25795
Location: Jumping on the bandwagon of opportunism

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 10:51 am Post subject:
From what l've seen of foxes they are not all the same. They do seem to always be on the look out for a meal and wouldm take a chicken. I'm not convinced that all foxes will kill several hens just for the sake of it. Some may just pick off the hens one by one. Even if it was not a fox this time they are about.

judyofthewoods

Joined: 29 Jan 2005
Posts: 804
Location: Pembrokeshire

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 12:07 pm Post subject:

Foxes often get the blame when there are all manner of predetors about. I have often seen the fox pass the chicken, ears flat against his head, trying to get away from the noise they made. I have caught my neighbour's dog red handed killing a chicken, or should I say red snouted. The next day when he was about another one vanished. My neighbour lost chicken himself, blaming the fox for a while, then admitted that he caught another dog killing the chicken, so the presence of his dog did not prevent another dog comming around.
Foxes do take chicken, and they do leave a pile of feathers, and I think its correct that they only kill several in an enclosed space (and of course they would collect the others if they were left lying about, its not some viscious pointless killing spree, but filling the larder when there is a bounty). Don't know from personal experience but I've been told that when dead chicken are left behind a fox may have been responsible if the head was bitten off, and if there are small puncture wounds either side of the head mink or other memeber of the weasel family was involved (had some like that myself, and there were also feathers, and the next day the dead one was collected, so mink do that too).
A study I have read suggests that the staple diet of foxes is sluggs, berries, insects, mice, voals, carrion (how many people actually see a lamb being killed by a fox - there are however many still born lambs and lambs dying of cold about - and incidentally, I have seen two dogs savage a ewe). My own experience observing foxes and in scatology backs this up, never pass up an opportunity to poke some fox poo when I see it. Yes, I have seen sheep wool in it, but see above. I have never seen any feathers in it. In another study I read, it said that foxes live in small family groups, with the dominant vixen breeding. The dog fox and extended family all chip in with bringing back food for her, a mouse here, a vole there. The problem arises when those family members get knocked off (a 'successful' lamping night perhaps?) and the vixen has to then find food herself, having to leave nursing cubbs behind she will go for whatever she can get, something bigger than the usual is better. That is when small livestock animals can disapear. I have had personal experience which can back up at least part of that. I was visited by a dogfox for a couple of weeks or so, allmost daily. he would take away bits of food I gave him, eating some himself. Then he vanished. A while later a vixen appeared, large saggy, empty teats, she emaciated. She seemed to know about the 'arrangement', knowing that she should come to the caravan door. This savage, hungry beast took food from my hand, as gently as she could, licking my fingers with great care. I never saw either of them again, but a while later I found a large fox carcass, which appeared to have been flung over the fence, the state of decomposition suggested that it may well have been the dogfox. I do know that some of my neighbours bring in the fireing squad, as I have found them tresspassing on my property more than once, owning up to what they were doing.

SparklyWellies

Joined: 24 Mar 2005
Posts: 88
Location: Oxfordshire

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 5:48 pm Post subject:
Wow, thanks for that Judy. So in the absence of neighbourhood dogs (we're actually 200m from boarding kennels!) I have to assume Mr. Sneaky Ferdinand Fox. I will have to ponder the idea of a covered run I think.

judyofthewoods

Joined: 29 Jan 2005
Posts: 804
Location: Pembrokeshire

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 5:53 pm Post subject:
dogs wander a long distance, my neighbour is over 1/2 mile away, and his dog has been seen much further away.

SparklyWellies

Joined: 24 Mar 2005
Posts: 88
Location: Oxfordshire

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 6:00 pm Post subject:
They are in "cages" so can't escape Judy (and she's a friend of mine, so I know) and we don't have any other neighbours less than, probably about a mile away, with dogs. So I'm kinda persuaded by the fox argument rather than the dog or red kite theory (which is the one I wanted to believe if I'm honest).

Treacodactyl
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 25795
Location: Jumping on the bandwagon of opportunism

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 6:06 pm Post subject:
Foxes do love fruit, grapes and gooseberries from my garden last year; they also eat earth worms.

organic john

Joined: 27 Jan 2005
Posts: 95
Location: Raunds, Northants

Posted: Tue Apr 05, 05 7:32 pm Post subject:
i had this problem last year and found it was an old vixen coming every night like clock work take one chicken and go back to the woods feed the cubs and come back for another but because i had so many chickens it wasnt until she took my best cockrel that i noticed so she had to go!!!

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