I want a gun to kill the things that are killing my chickens.....

[CapnMac]

ridiculously inexpensive, as are wi-fi cameras.

Set of three wireless cams for under $400 only about the cost of a 10/22 anymore.
And motion-activated low-light cams are pretty much bog standard right now.

 

[LiveLife]

Has anyone mentioned weasels yet? We don't have chickens, but one of our neighbors did, and it seems like they were always losing a few of them to weasels. And from what I've seen, it looks to me like weasels could wiggle their way in through some pretty small holes.

Wife says rats and weasels can actually go through the chicken wire opening and prey on chickens with weasels reported to kill the entire flock) and why smaller 1/2" wire fabric is preferred.

 

[.308 Norma]

LiveLife said: ↑
"Wife says rats and weasels can actually go through the chicken wire opening and prey on chickens with weasels reported to kill the entire flock) and why smaller 1/2" wire fabric is preferred."
That's what I was wondering about. As I've mentioned several times in other posts, my wife and I work as "ground squirrel exterminators" over on our friend's ranch in the spring and early summer. We leave the weasels alone though because they kill ground squirrels, and they have no problem at all chasing them down in their tunnels.
We do shoot badgers though. They kill ground squirrels too, but the badgers just dig the ground squirrels out, making the holes and tunnels even bigger for our friend's horses and cattle to step in and break legs.

 

[jmohme]

I have lived this exact problem.
We had our chickens and ducks in a large chain link enclosure. Racoons and other predators would clime the fence and still kill our birds.
Next we put netting over the entire 30ft x 45ft fenced area. Still an occasional racoon would find its way in. Usually we would hear the chickens squaking and be able to get outside and pop the predator with either my Glock 19 or when I was out of town (and that is quite often) the wife would get the culprit with her Ruger, but it also wakes the neighbors, so I picked up an Airforce .25cal PCP air gun with a silencer. It takes care of the pests a lot more quietly. I have light mounted on it and the little buggers usually cant get in as easily as they get out and are pretty easy targets. It is less than 25 yards from my door to the far side of the chicken pen.
I see no need to fire off a round that might end up in the neighbors house when a decent PCP will do the job quietly and efficiently.

It is always just one raccoon, opossum, or the occasional bobcat, so no need for a rifle with a 15 or more shot magazine.

We did also set live traps and that yielded good results, but not 100% .
When it does the predators still need to be disposed of, so again, why excite the neighbors with the discharge of a loud firearm when my 25 cal PCP does the job quite well?

 

[CoalTrain49]

Coyotes, eagles, hawks and racoons are the biggest problem here for people that have chickens.

Except I saw an otter go across my yard awhile back. Wonder what he was looking for? The lake is a half a mile away so it wasn't a fish.

 

[Remington1911]

Maybe out there. But ive killed coyote and fox in the same field on the same day. And have images of both in the same night on game camera many nights. We have a much healthier population of red fox than coyote. Maybe if there were more coyote it might matter. But ive got 20 years of game cam pics of fox and coyote and bobcat all in the same night. Dating back to game cams that took half a power grid to power and a 24mm film camera.

I won't be the only one here to say that coyote and fox do in fact live in the same area

I don't doubt you, perhaps the fox out your was are smarter and stay out of sight when the coyote is around. Both animals sit at the same spot in the food chain, and vie for the same food sources. What the fox eats the coyote does not get to eat.

Another thing that could be is there is just so much food around they really don't compete with each other, or the ranges are so small their daily hunts for food they don't need to go as far to find it, so a smaller range. Issue with this is the amount of the "top dog" (I just had to do it) coyote or fox will generally go up if there is more food around. So if there is enough food for two coyote you will generally have two, not one coyote and one fox.....but there are never always in mother nature, for your area I would bet on foxes being smarter to know just where they are and when to hide. A little like the dogs the woman talked about, killing a dog is very different then killing a human, a dog is seen as something in the coyotes turf, it is something to be run off or killed.

The reasons could be endless.

We had around my house something happen just like what she says in the video, we had a coyote that all you would ever see is his butt.....that or he way WAY over there looking at you, make a move to him and poof he was gone. I would say he would hang out roughly 300+ yards away, too far for these old eyes and iron sights. I had my chickens at the time, and he would come up after dark and have a try at the electric fence, but thought it hurt too bad to push that idea, Couple nights and he was off to more easy pastures. I never had a real issue with him. Neighbor bragged on shooting him at 400+ yards, he was replaced by a coyote that was not afraid of people, he would hang out roughly 50 yard away when I let my dogs out, and never gave up on the chicken house and started digging to get under it even with the concrete squares to stop digging, he just started farther out and was going to dig under the concrete. Neighbor lost his wifes little dog to him. I showed him the video and he was not changed, the old one never hung around your house and you wacked him at 400 yards, this one came up and grabbed your wifes dog off her leash and ran off with it. Do you think that was better. Nope nothing they all must die. Well good luck, there will always be one around.

He passed on, and new people moved in, not quite so country, but city moved out to the country, turned the barn into a ceramics....hut, kiln, whatever.

The current coyote, I don't see as often as the first, I never see him, but I sure do hear them at night....they are very afraid of people, but they do come close enough once and a while to hit the cameras.

 

[Remington1911]

I have lived this exact problem.
We had our chickens and ducks in a large chain link enclosure. Racoons and other predators would clime the fence and still kill our birds.
Next we put netting over the entire 30ft x 45ft fenced area. Still an occasional racoon would find its way in. Usually we would hear the chickens squaking and be able to get outside and pop the predator with either my Glock 19 or when I was out of town (and that is quite often) the wife would get the culprit with her Ruger, but it also wakes the neighbors, so I picked up an Airforce .25cal PCP air gun with a silencer. It takes care of the pests a lot more quietly. I have light mounted on it and the little buggers usually cant get in as easily as they get out and are pretty easy targets. It is less than 25 yards from my door to the far side of the chicken pen.
I see no need to fire off a round that might end up in the neighbors house when a decent PCP will do the job quietly and efficiently.

It is always just one raccoon, opossum, or the occasional bobcat, so no need for a rifle with a 15 or more shot magazine.

We did also set live traps and that yielded good results, but not 100% .
When it does the predators still need to be disposed of, so again, why excite the neighbors with the discharge of a loud firearm when my 25 cal PCP does the job quite well?

I had the entire thing on video once, a raccoon up the fence, then down head first the other side. We had by then a nylon net over the top (for hawks) and he just chewed through it. It was an unending battle.

I am not going to stay up all night in hopes I get lucky and they come by, I ran the fence, several rows and a row across the top, that stopped it for a while, then they figured out the gate was not electric, so over that they went. I had to get another transformer and wire up the gate itself. I did not want to try to hop over the wire, and this was just more easy, more expensive but easy to have the gate on its own system.

That finally worked and I did not have another issue till they burned down the entire coop. I "think" they went after an electrical cord and was pecking at it, The entire thing went up like the towering inferno, it was like 3 chicken stories tall, I put a HUGE amount of work into it only to get a call from a neighbor while at work saying your chicken coop is on fire.

After that I said hell with all animals, I only have the dogs now, and they are inside dogs, life is much more simple, but I do miss the eggs, and I have a great many more ticks in the yard.

 

[Remington1911]

Set of three wireless cams for under $400 only about the cost of a 10/22 anymore.
And motion-activated low-light cams are pretty much bog standard right now.

I have a standing argument with the well cameras will keep you safe group of people, well no, they will just document your demise.

Generally animals will run on a pretty rough schedule, if they are off schedule something somewhre else is more interesting then your stuff.

The camera will let you know a general time the bandit is coming by.

 

[Robert]

4 pages of how to protect chickens seems like more than enough. As with anything of value, a layered defense is your best bet...