I've thought that same thing... **** THOSE ETHICS! I've never seen in the county meeting minutes records of payments being made, though. Perhaps it's one of those ancient rules still on the books but never followed.
Andrewy
I've thought that same thing... **** THOSE ETHICS! I've never seen in the county meeting minutes records of payments being made, though. Perhaps it's one of those ancient rules still on the books but never followed.
Andrewy
Andrewy, It is not altogether unlikely for dogs to attack and kill a quantity of chickens or a whole flock and not eat them. Then later along comes the nightly patrol of fox, coyote, coon, possum, and/or rats who will not ignore a chicken banquet spread out before them. It would not be unusual to see a dog killed animal carcass fed on by any number of the usual suspects.
I have placed dead beaver near the center of my quarter section, hundreds of yds from water and when I checked back the next day there was no evidence of the beaver, not even blood. Apparently some animal(s) is/are dragging them away to a place of concealment before feasting. The smallest beaver ran about 60 lbs and some nearer to 80, I think, and they all vanished without a trace. Maybe one day I will find some bones or something but not so far in the last few years of my beaver trapping/shooting. I think it would have to be coyote or mountain lion as they were probably too heavy for anything else.
I guess if I cared enough I'd use an IR motion detecting camera and get pix. One of these days I will probably get one as I have several possible uses and it might be fun to see what all is wandering around at late and unusual hours while we are tucked snugly in our bed. If the activity of our motion triggered porch lights are any indication we will not lack for photographic subjects.
[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
"I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"
Dang! I had no idea beavers got that large. My company sells high resolution outdoor ethernet web cameras and I'd love to put one of them out in the yard... though the $1000 cost outweighs the desire!
The tragedy of the massacre was offset somewhat of my discovery this evening of our first egg! It's tiny, maybe 1/2 regular size, but it was so pristine and clean... perfect!
Andrewy
Andrewy, If you ever got close to the chewing end of a live beaver you'd swear it was a 200 lb monster. Those chisels they have for front teeth are most impressive and can be dangerous to the unwarry.
I did not hang any of these guys from a scale and could be overestimating but not by a huge margin. Reference works vary in their comments about adult beaver weight but beaver continue to grow throughout their life and finding indivduals at 60 lbs is not going to make it into the Guiness book of world records. Beaver in excess of 50 lbs are routine, at least around here.
[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
"I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"
It's been almost exactly one month, and I have had no more attacks on the adult chickens, and never seen any evidence or dogs or coyotes. I'm at a loss for what happened. HOWEVER...
now I'm starting to get a little upset! I ordered 20 or so baby chicks 2 weeks ago from Ideal to replace the massacred chickens, and they were ALL killed the night before last. I went in to check on the chicks and all were missing. I found pretty much every one stacked up in a pile off to the corner, with various bits missing. I've done some surfing, and this MO seems to be attributed to Rats. I have seen evidence of at least one rat running around. I bet it's one FAT rat about now, though.
I think it's time for a total coop redesign, and lockdown.
I'm off rat hunting tonight!
AndrewY
I start mine in the house where I can watch them until they are about 4 weeks old. By then they could put up a ruckus and let you know there was a problem, or get away from a predator. I check my property for evidence of predators fairly often, and sometimes bait a raccoon with a can of tuna fish, then see if he can outrun my 9 mm carbine with laser sight.
Dang Andrew, If it weren't for bad luck you might not have any luck at all! Rats can get through some pretty small holes. I wonder if two layers of the ole standby chicken wire separated by an inch or so with insulators and charged with a charger (outer layer hot, inner layer grounded) would do the deed. You could stagger the wire a half a hole width vertical and horizontal to make it take longer to get through thus ensuring getting zapped some.
Chickens on the inside would be very unlikely to contact the hot layer and a sapper infiltrating from the outside would get a good shock long before gaining access to the hot meal inside.
I used to raise rats (for live feeding an owl I rehabilitated for wild release) and learned that no matter hom much Purina rat chow you put in one end of the community cage that the rats would not stop working until they have taken every chunk to the other end and piled it up in "THEIR" pile. It didn't matter that it was in their cage, they had an instinct that drove them to "take possession" by putting it into their pile. So the rat behavior seems to fit your observation (no guarantee but not exclusionary either.)
[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
"I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"
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