Predators
I can’t think of any predator, or even most scavengers, that won’t eat a chicken if given the opportunity. When building a coop or chicken run, keep predators in mind. Some common predators that may be in your area include wolves, coyotes, racoons, possums, cats, dogs, hawks or eagles, and many other animals that just love a defenceless chicken. My setup has a 4’x8′ coop for the birds, with a fenced-in 6’x8′ chicken run with a roof. They also have a larger fenced in area that is open on top. Even though we have a pair of breeding hawks in the area, I have never had one attack our birds.
For both their coop and their run, I buried the bottom of the wire in the ground, with it bent outwards about a foot at the bottom to protect them from anything trying to dig its way in. At night, they are locked in the coop, and no predator (short of a bear) is going to get through that 3/4″ siding and metal door. Usually an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, so think about predators before they come across your flock.
The background picture on this page is of a predator that was hurting our rabbits, and killing our chickens – a racoon. He would come out at night and go hunting in our yard. If the rabbits didn’t see or hear him coming, or if one of the chickens decided to hide from us when we were putting them up, he would take a swipe at the rabbits leaving gashes in their skin, or he would make sure that chicken didn’t make that mistake again. It took us a few days to catch him, but the injuries and killings stopped once we relocated him far away. We used a live trap, and relocated him to an area with a pond so he would have a very easy transition with food and water close by, but we made sure he was FAR away from our animals.
We also had a nice eastern rat snake that found our nesting box and eggs, and was eating all it could carry. We would notice fewer eggs than our normal average every once in a while. I figured it was just a fluctuation but it kept happening. I finally caught the snake when it got greedy and just couldn’t get away when it heard me coming. Even though I built the coop to be predator proof (including mice and snakes) when locked, the snake would get in during the day when the coop door was open so the chickens could come and go as they please. When I caught it, it was in the nesting box and had 2 or 3 eggs (I don’t remember exactly) in its belly, and could barely move. We caught it live, relocated it to a horse barn we knew of that could benefit from fewer mice and rats. The farmer was glad to have him, and we were glad to be rid of him.
I hold no ill will towards animals who are predators. They are just doing what comes natural to them, and what God intended them to do. I know we need predators, and I am a big fan of the jobs they do in nature and how they keep a balance. However, I don’t want them eating or harming my animals. So I take extra precautions to keep them out, and if they find their way in, I relocate them elsewhere far away from humans if possible.
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