• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

John Champaign Writes

Adventures in Self Publishing

First Brush With A Predator

September 28, 2022 by John Champaign Leave a Comment

tejon mmexicano

I’ve been feeling somewhat smug that we hadn’t had a single issue with any predators and our chickens.  Over labor day weekend I was awakened shortly before dawn by frantic clucking.  I stuck my head out the window and saw a small raccoon investigating our coop.  I yelled at him, and as soon as he realized I was there he took off.  I put on a bathrobe and went out to investigate, and other than a worked-up chicken everything was fine.

Raccoons remember where food is, so unfortunately this means I now need to be doubly careful to make sure to always close the coop door or he might be back.

First Line of Defense

Chickens have a natural instinct to roost at night.  As the sun goes down, they’ll trot into a raised coop and bed down.  Most runs can be closed, ours is solid wood with a wooden door that slides into place.  This is primarily to protect the chickens – even if something gets into the run it hopefully won’t be able to get into the coop.

This, of course, relies on the door being opened in the morning and closed at night, which I forgot to do the night we had the problem.  I didn’t go out to close the door in the evening, so in the predawn, one of the chickens got up, wandered out into the run, and attracted the raccoon’s attention.

The coop would be very warm during the day and your chickens wouldn’t be happy if they were stuck in the coop, so it’s even more important to remember to open the door in the morning.  The chickens will probably start making noise if you don’t let them out.

At night chickens are like zombies, and if anything ever makes its way INTO the coop, they won’t defend themselves.  There is a similar behavior if you grab your chickens by their legs, they just hang there and go limp – they almost immediately stop fighting.

The Run

Our coop is attached to a run, with the door to the coop being inside the run.  This gives us SOME additional protection, as a predator needs to get into the run, then into the coop.  Otherwise, they need to go through solid wood.

Some animals might want to get into the run, as we have pellets for the chickens and other food we feed them there.  It isn’t the end of the world for us if something got in and ate the chicken’s food.  If we saw evidence of this, we’d certainly start thinking about fortifying the run – as we wouldn’t want something that was after the chickens to get in the same way.  AND, we wouldn’t be overjoyed at something else eating our chickens’ food.

Making The Run More Secure

Chicken wire is to keep chickens in, not to keep predators out, so a standard run shouldn’t be viewed as much protection.

There are some additional things you can do to make it harder for predators to get into a run:

  • Cover the top of the run with wire to help keep birds of prey away.
  • Dig a trench and bury the run into the trench.  If the bottom is deeper, it will be harder for anything to dig underneath.
  • Hardware cloth can be used to cover any opening, buried underneath the run or as a skirt around the coop to prevent things from getting in.
  • Motion sensor lights
  • A night camera so you can see what is messing with your coop
  • A dog that will protect the flock (instead of eating them)

Last Line of Defense

Chickens have beaks and claws and will try to defend themselves if attacked.  They really aren’t that tough and won’t be able to stand up to many of the things that like to eat chickens.  There are sad stories of owners coming upon a scene where something has attacked their chickens and their rooster died defending the hens.

Have you had anything attack your chickens?  What happened?  How have you modified your setup to prevent it in the future?

Related

Filed Under: Chickens

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Primary Sidebar

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 502 other subscribers

RECENT BLOG POSTS

  • Endless Seas: Waits For No Man
  • Friendship Magician
  • The Importance Of “Slack Time” In A Job
  • Endless Seas: Never Meet Your Idols
  • Endless Seas: Never Meet Your Idols

Categories

  • Academic Advice
  • Board games
  • Business
  • Chickens
  • Game Development
  • Real Estate
  • Role Playing
  • Self Publishing
  • Serialized Writing
  • Writing Ideas

Archives

  • March 2023
  • February 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • October 2020
  • August 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020

Recent Comments

  • Fighting the Great Developer Resignation on Many Software Developers Are Underpaid
  • John Champaign on The Economics of Keeping Chickens
  • Jim on The Economics of Keeping Chickens
  • John Champaign on Education Theater
  • Catherine Holloway on Education Theater

Copyright © 2023 · News Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in