Has anybody on here had to deal with these #@%@ things? I have lost 6Blue Cochin bantum hens and my rooster, yesterday it murdered my guinea hen in the barn, in one week. And has stolen all the eggs.... Chickens are in a stall converted to a hen house in my barn. I know part of the problem is we no longer have any goats or horses in there ( I am too busy to care for them in the spring-fall). I am thinking about getting some llamas just to get some animals in there to protect the barn. I am lining the coop floor with chicken wire today and putting a 2 strand electric fence up a long th e bottom of the barn today
. My neighbor is setting a trap across the stream where I saw it 3 days ago. I am so upset that guinea was my favorite and a very good sky predator alarm
Thanks I had to vent about that over grown weasel
Fisher Cats
I had a weasel get into my first coop 4 years ago, killed all but one. They were the first chickens we incubated, so sad. We had to redo are coop and have not lost one since. My cat kills weasels, she brings them home for me to see. I worry about her getting herself killed. She's a good hunter, but has never killed one of my chickens.
My barn cats are my weasel protectors.................those (*&*%^%#%$ things are dreadful to our feathered friends. It just took me one terrible experience with them to realize we needed to weasel-proof ALL our coops! So sorry you had the same experience, hope it helped you to vent a bit! lol Maybe your neighbor will catch it in the trap. My DH caught 4 in his live traps over a two week period. We then got several cats and they too kill the weasels and bring them to the back door to show me..............they know they get a SUPER GOOD treat when they do! :-)
Belinda
Okay, I have never seen a weasel here , but that doesnt mean we dont have 'em I guess! How do you know if it is a weasel getting your eggs? I was so upset yesterday morning. Mama BPR started setting , as I mentioned earlier, She had 11 eggs, she sat one night and when I got up yesterday, I found neatly broken eggs licked clean on the floor of the barn! Some thing had literally reached under Mama and stole half of her eggs, but didnt hurt her!!!! What can pick up eggs and take them out of a nest and never upset the hen? Or the Protective Daddy Roo?
I put Mama in a 4x4 rabbit cage, with her eggs that were left and she sat on them, and is doing fine! But what should I be looking for?? The baby Brown eggers are now 41/2 weeks old and whatever it was didnt harm them!
This message was edited Apr 4, 2007 7:15 PM
Oh Eufaula, that sounds just like a chicken snake. Girl, I have seen them be SO sneaky and so sly. They move so gently that the mommas don't even notice! GGGGGGGggggggggggggggrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr - - - you would have know if it were a weasel, believe me. They love chickens and leave feathers everywhere! The snakes are only after the eggs, and those Daddy roos usually don't see them especially if it is nighttime. I have a light on in all my coops/pens now for that exact reason. Those roos will chase those darn snakes right out of there if they can see them!
Best of luck!
Belinda
Hey B., I thought about a snake ! but a snake wouldnt open the egg and eat out the insides! Then leave the shell! Something actually breaks the egg in Half( you can see the nibbles around the edge of the shell) then licks the inside clean! Some thing definitely has " Hands"! Whatever it is or was , cant get to her now ! Thank heavens!
And thanks to the drop in temps , I think it will hold the snakes at bay for a little while longer!
I would think that you have rats. They leave the shells behind. They will hurt a young bird but usually do not bother the older ones. Good luck. We leave bate out wired into the inside of a perferated pipe to kill the rats.
This is a fisher cat (martin, bigger than a weasel) at my house,they are really big. I have seen it several times this yr and many last. They are about 12 lbs+,and about 25-30 inches long they will kill a small dog or a cat so my cats steer clear.Think minature wolverine. They do not leave any of the chicken behind, except a big pile of feathers. The fisher cat also eats the eggs and leaves the shell behind. I no longer have rats because the fisher killed them all too!
Sorry to hear about the guinea hen !!!!
Redo your coop with poutry wire and it will be fine and just
ask your freind if he got anything ...
Do you have any other guinea's??? If not the hatcherys will have some in may some time.... Sorry about your pet guinea.. If you have eggs from the guinea put them under a 250 watt light or a hen that is sitting on eggs.
Tracey
This message was edited Apr 8, 2007 4:23 PM
All the hens that are left are pullets and just started laying. My coop is a horse stall converted to a coop inside the barn I stapled chickenwire around the bottom so it covers the floor 1 ' and covered it with bedding. So far everyone is still alive. And nothing has been trapped yet.
I am going to look at some llamas this weekend. Hopefully having some big critters in the barn will help.
The bigger the better!!! Keep an eye on the chickens so they aren't scared of them. Good Luck!!
Tracey
OH my ~ I can't imagine a cat that size! eeee-Yikkkkeesss! I'm sure all the weasels & rats have run scared for their lives. Ick. I don't guess I've even seen such thing around here and hope I never do. Are they more like a bobcat type of creature?
Ok, did some homework.............you had my curiousity up on this one. Those crazy things look like a weasel/ferret/cat combo on steroids!!!!!! Those hands to me look like human hands (sort of like a coons hands), no wonder they can snatch and kill things so easily with all those little fingers! Found a neat link I wanted to share if anyone cares to check into it:
http://home.mcn.net/~wtu/fisher.html
Be sure to look at the pics, those cats have quite the set of teeth! Hope you keep those things up North, chicory31. Anything that can kill a porcupine has my full respect. Maybe your trap will catch one so you don't have to worry any longer. Be careful!
Ewhewwwwwww! Never saw anything like that before ,around here! Dont want any either! You can keep 'em.......Please!!!!
Oh come on You all can share this one!
Actually they are a weasel only much larger as some have found out and finding it disturbing.
The chickens will have to deal with whatever moves into the barn(llamas or ponies) they don't share the stall with them anyhow.
Yeah we can thank our state government for reintroducing this one. I
have seen many of them here they are quite shy just not about stealing chickens, many people in the suburbs of Hartford lose cats and small dogs to these things.
Yuck :: keep those critters a way!!! Has any one heard of a muskrat??? They are the same thing all most .
How are the hens doing??? Don't put the light to close to the chickens because if they knock it over it will start a fire in the stal if you have straw or hay or white pine shavings ...
Tracey
This message was edited Apr 11, 2007 4:02 PM
No muskrats are different. They are a rodent, but they are the only one in their genus, eat mostly plants but will eat some some fish, clams and crawdads. Mink will kill them so will fox and coyotes.They will tear a pond up!
I have lights in my barn so I just leave those on for a few hours at night. The girls that are left are doing fine and finally the young ones layed some eggs last week for the first time
eufala sounds like you may have a possum,you are lucky it didn`t get the hen too.
shannon
Chicory31, you are right about the weasel family, except in size from smallest to largest goes: weasel, mink, marten, fisher, badger, wolverine. What I left out was skunks, of which there are 3 or 4 subspecies between the marten and fisher sizes. My remedy for keeping out predators is to fence the chickens in as though I was caging the varmints... Chainlink for the outside run so far has kept even brown bears out. Wire over the top and edging the perimeter 8 inches underground. Some snowy weather I have to bang the top wire to keep it from sagging. By the way we have all the weasel family here in Alaska except badgers and skunks.
Fishercats are called that because of thier cry, thats what I heard anyways. Chicory if you would like a couple guineas I have 10 in the brooder (regular colored) and atleast 16 different colored ones in the incubator (I really wanted the colored ones and that was smallest amount of eggs I could get at the time) and you are more than welcome to some. Just drop me a line!
Fishers are nasty little creatures
skunks often steal eggs from under hen,break them open,lick them clean and leave the shells
Two nights ago something got into my barn and cut threw that kind of plastic chicken wire. And took two chickens and injured one by ripping out some of its back feathers and slashed it. And we have to rebuild the coop because its recked. and it also slashed a whole on the other end of the inside coop.
I think it might be a weasel. But I'm not sure.
Seabob, I have heard fisher cats can rip through chicken wird. They are nasty buggers. I've heard stories of them attacking large live stock! We found out several weeks ago that we have one next door to us with a litter of kits. I have been putting the chickens in a little earlier and making sure my cats are in at night too. So far so good, but these things are nasty, aggressive creatures. They are in the weasel family, so keep in my they can get in from low places and high places. Check your ceiling areas and see its getting in from there. I lost my first batch of chicks three years ago. Never found out what, but figured it was a racoon or fisher cat. It came in from the ceiling where there was a space between the garage and their coop. There were opening that we had to board up. We basically had to go through and seal every nook and cranny. Good luck. From what I have been told by my neighbor, (he is an ecologist, and is the one who spotted our fisher), they will not stay in populated places. It may have put up camp if it has babies and will move on once it is able. I have also been told they will encompass a 30mile square area. Oy!
ceeadsalaskazone3... aka... Carol,
Nice to read a post from you. How's life up in AK ? We have the badgers and skunks here ... mostly skunks and a few porcupine ... plus mink and Least Weasels too (Ermine in winter). Thank goodness ... no raccoons within 10 miles. We wouldn't have poultry if we had to fight off raccoons. I still find feral cats to be the worst problem for poultry in these parts. Kelly in Moxee
Janastasio
We checked around the corner of the ceiling and there was insulation pushed out and fell through the rip in the deer netting that we had tacked across the top of the coop. We're thinking of using 19 gauge hardware cloth if we can find it. But if we can't find it, what should we use if they can get through chicken wire?
Most of my coop is enclosed by chicken wire. I have not had a problem (yet) with anything getting through that. Did you say yours was enclosed by metal chicken wire or was it plastic? Mine is metal, so I think that is your best bet. We use heavy weight staples from a staple gun to put it up. Nice thing with this is that it is pliable to you can get it to cover awkward spots. That is what we had up by our ceiling. I'm betting that is prob. where yours did in fact come in. They are clever buggers! If you cannot get wire, can you get a peice of wood to board that spot up?
Oh yeah, another fun tid bit! As LoraK said about a Fishers cry. They sound like a woman screaming. Its a horrible sound. These guys are nocturnal unless food is sparce, then they will be forced to come out during the day to find food. Listen around night fall. Alot of times you can hear these guys. Before my neighbor confirmed we had one, I had been suspicious because of the weird sounds I was hearing in the woods at night. Sounded like an animal being killed, but I think it was this fishers scream.
ewwww! i heard terrible stories and even saw a picture of one of these at guineafowl.com. then last year we went camping in OK and one came near our site, swam right up in the water!
just do the best you can, including a red light, electrify you chicken coop, somehting!
kelly, Carol has passed away. that is why there are flowers under her username. click on them, it takes you to the Memory Garden forum and there is a thread there where you can post and read tributes, etc...
tf
I'm in the middle of covering everything around the inside and the outside with 19 gauge cloth. Since fishers can eat threw wood. And I was interested in how some peoples cats killed weasels, but fishers kill cats since fishers are more vicious. So what kind of pet kills fishers?
This message was edited Jul 2, 2008 7:26 PM
a colt? remington? winchester?
I've never heard of peoples pets being able to kill a fisher. I also havent heard of them eating wood, but I suppose if its hungry and there is food on the other side! After our first incident with our coop getting over taken, after we sealed every nook and cranny, I kept a baby moniter down there for a week! Worst week of sleep my husband and I ever had! I would wake him up every 20min and make him go down and check them!
"a colt? remington? winchester?"
LOL That is a good one
thank you. have had my share of predators to shoot lately... though my gun is a much cheaper brand LOL...
So Tam you say we have them nasty critters here in Oklahoma????? I have never heard of them or seen them. Just maybe up in the panhandle they could be.
it was over in the Blackfoot National Grasslands... i think they are also called water cats... just last June.
I finally sealed the whole coop...well actually built a whole new coop, but i heard something rather bigish crawling around in the barn. what if theres i whole in the coop! What should I do, because if sounded like the sound a fisher makes! HELP!
Bump! I'd turn my dogs loose in there.
Better be mighty big dogs, a lots of em, and you better be ready to apply first aid, cause they are gonna get torn up before they get it killed...
I'm just wondering if Chicory ever got the one that got her birds???
Well they are big dogs--2 German Shepherds and an Akbash so about a total of 300lbs (not counting the 46lb border collie who would just bark like a maniac and run around) and I wouldn't want them to kill the fisher--just worry it out of the space in an emergency. Most predators don't want to be bothered while predating..unless the pay off is pretty great. The GSD are into pack dynamics--they work together in quite a scary way. And you can call them off if it gets too intense. If I thought something was trying to get my chickens in the dark--I probably would let the dogs out.
I still don't understand how Karelian Bear Dogs, which aren't that large, can take on a bear--even in a pack. I wonder if they would guard poultry? Actually I think they are more hunters than guards.
We lost several ducks to a fisher cat. Chewed right through a piece of plywood and dragged out the ducks. One of our neighbors lost several chickens when it torn through here chickenwire. This was a few years ago but last year one of the turkey farmers in CT lost most of his flock. Here is the link to the news story: http://www.norwichbulletin.com/news/environment/x1596401152
They are a nasty creature.