Sad Morning....
This morning I went out to let the chickens out for the day and I discovered something had killed one of the hens during the night. I was so sad and angry.
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Somehow, either I left one outside when I closed them up for the night and it was killed after that point, or it was killed before I put them all in and I didn't notice. Either way, I missed something!
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I do check around the pen to double check I haven't left any hens out, but maybe I missed one. Or it was already killed and I didn't see it (it was laying behind a tree trunk), which like I just stated, I feel I did a fairly decent job of looking wound the pen and I didn't see it. It makes me so sad this happened.
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I try my best to protect my girls, but when something fails and one gets killed by a predator it just stinks! It really makes me upset. This is my first loss since getting chickens a year and a half ago. Doesn't seem like a long time, but we live in the bush and there are quite a few predators. We have raccoons, coyotes, skunks, weasels, and owls. Our neighbours had lost some of their hens to owls, which is a hard predator to protect them from.
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Growing up in Oregon, we had chickens that roamed the yard in the summers and every once in a while we would lose one to a predator like a skunk, racoon or neighborhood dog (irresponsible dog ownership was rampant). I would do that here but I fear we would lose way more than we did in Oregon because I am in a more "wild" area. So the best and safest option for the girls is to have their safe large open fenced area to explore with plenty of entertainment and space. They truly are happy health hens!
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We will be doing some additional predator proofing this week and trying to figure out who the culprit was. I am leaning towards a weasel from the clues he left behind. My Dad also advised me from his experiences with weasels and chickens. Additionally, I had seen a weasel this summer (brown coat) and my Father-In-Law saw it in its winter colour (white coat) this fall. Both sightings were near the coop areas.
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Last night I realized there was one small opening in the door where a weasel could easily gain access and kill more chickens. I asked my Dad what he thought and he suggested covering it with a lid from a can. Tonight I was lucky enough to remember I had just put a lid from canned peas into our recycling. It ended up being the perfect fix!
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Well, off to bed. I will post another entry soon as we've had quite the cold weather and it has really effected my hens laying and I've had to make plenty of changes to things. I want to share what happened egg wise and what I've had to do to attempt to fix things.
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Stay tuned! Happy Christmas and a wonderful New Year!!
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~M~
