for those of u on my white showgirl egg lists for spring, i will not be able to fill ur orders for them. we had a preditor attack last night that whiped out all of our white showgirl hens, pullets and youngsters we had for spring breeding. all i have left of them is the showgirl roosters that where in the with the silkie girls. so we will be starting our whites over again. i'm so heart broken i am beside myself, i can't stop crying, i'm so devistated all my girls and babies r gone. i still have the 2 silkie roos who where in with the girls they r all that survided the attack on their pen. i still have the other colors of showgirls they r fine and so r the others. i wanted to make sure u all knew i'd not be able to do eggs for them so u had time to find someone else to get ur white showgirls from. i'll not be able to do eggs for them again till fall or next spring since we will be hatching them all for us to build our stock back up.
i'm very sorry,
silkie
to those on my spring showgirl list....
{{{{hugs}}}}}} So sorry .It is not your fault.
I am so sorry for your loss silkie. the predators can be devistating..i know there are coyotes here, and we watch very carefully..i will shoot any i see..
again i am so sorry..
Silkie
I hate that for you! I loved their look. I lost a little bantie to a hawk last week. She was mixed, but loved her anyway. So sorry.
George
Oh Silkie...I am so sorry about this. It is an awful thing. I wish I could say something to make it better. Sadly there are no magic words. I will be thinking of you often. {{{HUGS}}} ♥
Jeanmarie
Silkie there are no words. Between you and mox, wished there was something we could do to help. Please know your in our hearts, and we cry for you also. Hay
silkie,
I was not on the list, but I just wanted to let you know I'm sorry for your loss.
{{{{hugs}}}}
kristin
thank you all, it means so much. i know there is no magic words and nothing will ever replace them but i won't let them go in vein like that we will get what destroyed them and we will rebuild again. my showgirls were the world to me just like my kid's are it's a test of strength, my heart is ackeing at the loss of my girls who i can nolonger hold, see, spoil and love but all is not lost yet....
i still have my origional roo and one of the girls's baby roo who is a breeder also now. AND.... there is 4 of my friends here locally that have my bloodlines i totally didn't think of. i'm going to talk to all of them and see if they will help me get back on my feet with them so i still have my bloodlines going. omg, i don't know why i didn't think of that before!! it won't be the same but i lost 5 generations of breeding in one night thanks to the stupid animal that got them if my friends help me i don't have to loose all 5 generations of breeding and bloodline i can gain some of that back through my stock they have. i'll keep u all posted how things go and let u know when we find out what the preditor is and when we get it. right now it looks like 2 probs norway rats and a mink or a weasil possible coon. i just pray they all made it through the night and the traps caught something.
Oh NO.. I'm so sorry Silkie! Don't worry for a minute about your list... I know the horror you must feel.. I do hope your friends are able to get your bloodlines going again. I feel so helpless.. but I offer my support, and if there is anything I can do I'm here.
I have a terrible problem with a predator, and was just thinking of my losses this morning.. Don't be surprised if it doesn't come back right away.. it may not come back till it's hungry again. Don't give up.. it will be back sooner or later.
My thoughts and prayers are with you.
So Sorry for your loss silkie my thoughts are with you♥
Silkie
If Turkens(naked necks) are part of your "formula". I have a pure breed flock. I would be more than happy to send you some eggs in the spring if it would help.
George
yes they r but i'd need them to be bantam size which is really hard to find these days. thank u for the offer george that is so sweet and thoughtfull.
didn't catch anything yet but the poison blocks we put in the rat holes is gone. we r seriously wondering if rats could have done all the damage. there is definate evidance of rats there and we have trapped a bunch but we thought we got them all or most of them. even in the clean untouched snow there is no tracks at all to show a preditor was there or anything. could an infestation of norway rats from them logging next to my friends property cause them to do so much damage in one night?
it has been a prob since they logged there but nothing like this before. u know how i said i lost some over winter to it being so cold here i thought they slept outside alone? well now i'm wondering if those where attacked or got bit by rats. i didn't see anything not normal but to be honest i did not go over them good either. it looked like they had slept alone outside in freezeing temps so i just assumed that was what they died from it was natures way of culling the weak so to speak. i could kick myself now cuz mabe that was signs then something was getting them but it was one here and there i never put 2 and 2 together before. has anyone else ever had rat probs before? how do u get rid of the darn things?? we have killed about 25 of them this winter already and this is our first time ever haveing to deal with them. i moved my flock there 3 years ago and have never had anything attack any of the animals, this is so very odd.... any thoughts or suggestions??
yes unfortunately Silkie rats will move in if they logged near you..it took out their hiding places..keep going with the poison, thats what i had to do years ago..and try to seal up any holes that you see, that thye could get in..im with you, and if you need anything please dmail me..
cindy
how do u seal up the holes? we have been dumping water down them to see if it will freeze them with ice or flood them but other than that i don't what to do for the holes. we caught so many it killed the rat traps so i found 5 left at the hardware store and bought them and set them yesterday too. hopefully that will help also. any advice would be great. i live in town so i've only had feild mice here and there but my cats or the strays get them. so other than traps and poison i don't know what else to do for them cause we've never had to deal with them before.
thanks so much!!
mar
well one thing that would help alot is to get alot of glass and break it and put it down the holes, that way when they try to dig thru it, it will tear them up and kill them..then the poison and then fill then with dirt or cement..but this time of year i know its hard to do the cement thing. unfortunately even our dirt is frozen..but the glass and poison will help greatly..
cindy
Silkie,
I'm so sorry to read about your loss. :(
Do you have minks there? Some friends of mine lost around 300 birds before they could catch the pair of minks. I'm going to help them restock their white and buff silkies but they also lost all of their frillback pigeons and I don't have those.
Would it be possible to put down hardware cloth until you end the problem or is the coop too big?
glass is a great idea but i don't know where to get any. too cold for cement closest thing we can do for that is tomarrow it to be really cold we r takeing as many 5 gal buckets of water as we can over filled and dumping holes in hopes they freeze down in the holes. the well doesn't work there now so i have no way to use a hose to flood them now.
we caught one rat today however sadly we found a serama hen in her coop mangled from head to bum down one side. it is definately the rats nothing was broken into on the cages this time and it's not the damage a chicken would have done. i got another box of poison blocks gonna put them out too. we reset traps also. tomarrow i will go see if anywhere else still has more traps for sale. alot of places here r not carrying them since winter. hopefully someone else will still have some.
my partner breeder is gonna help me rebuild the showgirls, someone i sold a few babies to is gonna work with me to get 3 of the babies back in trade once the weather is better and the rodent problem is gone so that is a big answer to prayer in it's self there is still hope and a great chance at rebuilding the flock back with my bloodlines not diluted any.
yes we have minks and many preditors here but all the signs show it is the norway rats i'm possative after seeing the serama hen. the bottom of all the runs r hardware cloth, dividers, sides and tops r chicken wire. it is to expensive here to buy that much wire. i have 4 in one huge runs with coops attached at backs all off the ground. they r climbing the legs to get into the pens then going through the chicken wire. we r gonna try to get metal to make the posts slippery so they can't climb it in hopes that helps also.
You can do like the do on ships. Make round shields that are wide enough they can not get by. Like the hoods they make for bird feeders to keep out squirrels.
Is your pen on the ground? Remember that they can jump a long way. You may need to make a metal shield to keep them from jumping up.
Oh my , I am sooooo sorry
I know how hard it is to work on a breed so hard and be doing sooo good
only to get wiped out
If there is something I can do let me know
I'm not a huggy person but DANG
You need a hug
(((((HUG))))))))
did I do that right?
Cant really do a hug wrong as I see it. Who says your not huggy?
More hugs for Silkie {{{{HUGS}}}}
Hey
Sewincircle
you're right close by!!!
awe, thank u,u all r great friends. i lost 2 serama hens since the first attack unfortunately. but we did find out it is definately the rats. we have trapped 2 of them so far. they r eating the poison there is green poo on the snow. so hopefully we will have some more down soon.
Finding out does help.. even if it's painful. I sure hope you get them all soon.. I'm glad you have help too!!! Do keep us posted on the rebuilding project of your flock..
Our thoughts and prayers are with you. :)
Wow! I thought that rats were only interested in the food and eggs... I had no idea they'd KILL the birds.
Again, I'm so sorry for your loss but I'm with ZZ, you've got the first step down... you've identified the problem.
Hang in there!
{{{{{{{{{{Hugs!!!!!}}}}}}}}}}}
Kristin