Country Life

Heard the neighbor’s chickens raising a fuss last night. Got a flashlight and went over to check. 2 or 3 hens were out of the coop staggering around looking dazed and moaning. So I hopped the fence and poked the flashlight into the coop through the flip door and was greeted by a big fat possum hissing at me. Gdmnt. Fortunately the coop has two big doors. Unfortunately the big door was stuck where the possum was. Found a shovel - there always seems to be a shovel nearby in the country. Reached in through the open big door and banged the backside of the other big door until it opened. Meanwhile one of the hens had gotten in between my feet and was sitting on my boots. And the possum had wedged itself in the far corner, so I jammed the shovel between him and the coop wall and did kind of a left handed hockey chip shot and sent the possum out through the now open door. He got himself together and ran for the gate, squeezed underneath and was gone. I collected the hens and checked each for blood. Looked like the possum was just there for eggs which were smashed everywhere and all over the hens. Put everyone back in the coop and shut the doors. The gdmn rooster slept through the whole thing.

“Rooster slept through the whole thing”- what about the neighbor who owns the chickens??

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Originally Posted by nahbspect

“Rooster slept through the whole thing”- what about the neighbor who owns the chickens??

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They work twelve different jobs each. I am exaggerating, but the husband is a night stocker at the Loews. His wife works at the IGA. Both are part time accountants. The husband is also the tax collector for the town. The wife is also the accountant for the fire department. The husband helps run a flower catering business for weddings that is shut down but still needs work on the flower farm. And we just found out the wife was one of the early recorded cases for Covid19, and she is finally cleared to start back to work Monday. So I am guessing they were either working or asleep.

I don't mind helping out. Just seems like if you don't help when you see it is needed, then everything just gets worse.

The rooster is actually pretty good in the daylight. He's fought off a couple hawks that I know of. But chickens in the dark are really hopeless. No idea what's happening. Just that someone or something knocked them off their perch and is now chewing on their leg.

Arm the chickens!

My wife asked if I was sure it was a possum and not the easter bunny collecting eggs for easter.

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Originally Posted by Peter Polack

Arm the chickens!

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The damn liberal chickens took away their guns.

Lucky it wasn't a raccoon. They make a hash of chickens.

One thing I have learned about country living: if you find a wire down, do not touch it. If a tree has fallen on it don't cut the tree off. Call 911.

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Originally Posted by j44ke

My wife asked if I was sure it was a possum and not the easter bunny collecting eggs for easter.

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She might have a point here...

We are lookin for some dirt. I miss it. All of it.

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Originally Posted by ides1056

Lucky it wasn't a raccoon. They make a hash of chickens.

One thing I have learned about country living: if you find a wire down, do not touch it. If a tree has fallen on it don't cut the tree off. Call 911.

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If I had opened the coop and there was a raccoon, I wouldn’t have had time to check the chickens. Raccoons are not amenable to being cornered, especially with a mouthful of chicken guts. Scary animals.

Growing up in Norfolk VA downed wire safety was something that got driven into me by school assembly after school assembly what with hurricanes, tropical storms and coastal thunderstorms. Also why we ran all power from the road underground to the house.

Jorn...I see a varmint rifle in your future.

I sprung for a pellet gun.

Single shot 22 with CB caps or subsonics, less noise than clapping your hands together. Much more effective though.

Raccoons and coyotes are the ones you don’t want to corner. Less worried about a fox or possum. A nice air soft gun works well for critter deterrent, I’m not one for actually killing them.

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Originally Posted by rwsaunders

Jorn...I see a varmint rifle in your future.

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Originally Posted by ides1056

I sprung for a pellet gun.

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Maybe a slingshot.

If a possum can get in, then any number of other more dangerous critters also can, after which it won't be just eggs that are gone.

Sounds to me like they need a more secure coop.

Who cares what it was or how to get rid of it. This is the moral of the story:

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Originally Posted by j44ke

I don't mind helping out. Just seems like if you don't help when you see it is needed, then everything just gets worse.

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Originally Posted by rec head

Who cares what it was or how to get rid of it. This is the moral of the story:

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I'm pretty sure the chickens care, and are more concerned about a long-term solution than they are about the philosophical implications of the story.

I would want Jorn as my neighbor.

The coop definitely need to be more secured.

Who cares what it was or how to get rid of it. This is the moral of the story:

Quote Originally Posted by j44ke View Post

I don't mind helping out. Just seems like if you don't help when you see it is needed, then everything just gets worse.


Absolutely the moral of the story.

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Originally Posted by ides1056

Lucky it wasn't a raccoon. They make a hash of chickens.

One thing I have learned about country living: if you find a wire down, do not touch it. If a tree has fallen on it don't cut the tree off. Call 911.

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I used to work a gig at a large wildlife rehabilitation facility north of Seattle. There was some sort of dock demolition and the construction company doing the work contracted our facility to hand-raise the 80 or so seagull chicks they were going to displace (can't recall the species and I'm not that familiar with West Coast gulls anyway). One night, one of the raccoons managed to escape and get into the seagull chick enclosure area (no small feat as I recall, by the way).
One raccoon. Killed them all. Every single one. It was nothing short of traumatizing - a bloodbath.

Chickens are all outside this morning in pouring rain searching for drowned worms. Seems like great fun in chicken world.

Years ago I worked in a humane shelter that had part of the animal control contract with the town. People could rent Hav-a-Heart traps from us to get rid of problem animals. It was all possums and raccoons. I could reach in with leather gauntlet gloves to grab a possum but not the raccoons. Too fast and fierce. The shelter was on about 20 acres of town land with a state park behind it, so we'd just take the traps out and let the raccoons go. A year ago I drove by the spot where the shelter was but it is gone now and instead the whole area has been replaced by a housing development. I am sure all the raccoons are happy.

People would come in to rent the traps and they'd say things like "Coyotes ate all my cats" or "Fox got in the chicken coop again and killed all of them" or "Weasels are killing my chickens" or "Weasels killed all my rabbits" etc. etc. etc. Every time they'd come back with raccoon after raccoon. "Haven't caught the fox yet, just keep getting these stupid raccoons." Well, you don't have a fox....

Years ago, I had a groundhog make a nice home under our patio and I could not catch Phil for the life of me. An older gentleman in the neighborhood that we referred to as Trapper Jack offered to trap him, as long as I wasn't skittish about the groundhog's fate. He also warned me that a few other animals might be trapped before we caught Phil. Three opossums, one skunk and two raccoons later, Phil was nabbed. In terms of the raccoons, Jack claimed that they would return if he didn't take them at least five miles away and his plan was to take them one mile away and send them to raccoon heaven. I remember one night, hearing the trap clanging, I looked outside and a raccoon the size of a bear cub was doing his best to destroy the trap.

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Originally Posted by monadnocky

I used to work a gig at a large wildlife rehabilitation facility north of Seattle. There was some sort of dock demolition and the construction company doing the work contracted our facility to hand-raise the 80 or so seagull chicks they were going to displace (can't recall the species and I'm not that familiar with West Coast gulls anyway). One night, one of the raccoons managed to escape and get into the seagull chick enclosure area (no small feat as I recall, by the way).
One raccoon. Killed them all. Every single one. It was nothing short of traumatizing - a bloodbath.

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They did that in my barn. All the chickens and the keets I made the mistake of letting out.

I am not bloodthirsty, but I will kill raccoons with no remorse.

There was a tail-less raccoon that raided the trash bin at the house I lived in sophomore year. It must have been fifty pounds or more and looked like a Panda.

i hooked up my irrigation yesterday and tested it. all good. ran it over night to water stuff real nice after some long drought, wake up to massive flood in driveway and a well pump sputtering to not die. country life alright. wonder what changed between the test and the evening? pressure and time i guess.

Moved to the country 4 years ago now. On ~13 acres. Have chickens. Lessons learned.

1. Shoot to kill or don't shoot at all. Do not under any circumstances shoot anything with soft, hard, pump action or air powered at vermin or anything that you do not intend to kill. I went down this road. I learned torturing animals is not my bag. This is just how it is. So either live with the vermin or get a proper rifle and learn how to use it. No animal deserves to suffer. Shoot to kill or don't shoot at all. I now use a Remington 700 bolt action .223.

Our problem is coyote, wild pack dogs but mostly asshole neighbors who let their dogs run wild which is against state and local laws but unenforceable. What is legal is shooting aggressive dogs on your own property which my neighbors are aware of but still let their animals run unchecked.

2. If you have chickens and care about them then build a proper secure coop including a nice run with a welded wire perimeter apron. My coop and run is built to withstand a 400lb wild boar as well as anything down to 1/2"(snakes anyone?). When we are home and hanging out(which is most of the time) we let them range in a much larger fenced area(about 5000'sqr). I'd let them range all over like we use to but ammunition isn't cheap and it's backbreaking work dumping your neighbors 100lb dead dog at his driveway.

3. If you live near me and love your dog, keep him off my property.

Many more lessons but these were germane to the OP.

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Originally Posted by crumpton

Moved to the country 4 years ago now. On ~13 acres. Have chickens. Lessons learned.

1. Shoot to kill or don't shoot at all. Do not under any circumstances shoot anything with soft, hard, pump action or air powered at vermin or anything that you do not intend to kill. I went down this road. I learned torturing animals is not my bag. This is just how it is. So either live with the vermin or get a proper rifle and learn how to use it. No animal deserves to suffer. Shoot to kill or don't shoot at all. I now use a Remington 700 bolt action .223.

Our problem is coyote, wild pack dogs but mostly asshole neighbors who let their dogs run wild which is against state and local laws but unenforceable. What is legal is shooting aggressive dogs on your own property which my neighbors are aware of but still let their animals run unchecked.

2. If you have chickens and care about them then build a proper secure coop including a nice run with a welded wire perimeter apron. My coop and run is built to withstand a 400lb wild boar as well as anything down to 1/2"(snakes anyone?). When we are home and hanging out(which is most of the time) we let them range in a much larger fenced area(about 5000'sqr). I'd let them range all over like we use to but ammunition isn't cheap and it's backbreaking work dumping your neighbors 100lb dead dog at his driveway.

3. If you live near me and love your dog, keep him off my property.

Many more lessons but these were germane to the OP.

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this, if you dont mean to kill the thing, dont attack it, period. i watch my neighbor torture animals with a bb gun, if torturing animals is your thing, go for it, but im bigger than they are so i just scare them away, or i kill them if its necessary. These animals want an easy meal, its not hard to make it hard.

a solar powered timer door on my coop was the best investment, now i dont need to rely on me to close them in at night.

Right now the coyotes have a den on our property. They are really giving the deer a run for the money and by run I mean RUN!! I've been in the woods when three or four deer went zooming through and they were not running from me. Deer bits and pieces lying around that might attract a bear (as would the neighbors garbage) so I am looking both ways in the woods.

I'd rather have coyotes running the deer than chickens laying eggs, so we probably won't keep chickens once the house is done. Plus we have bobcats and everyone in the neighborhood seems to have a fisher story, so chickens would just be sitting ducks.

Here in town though, the neighbors' chickens are an amusing form of TV. But the coop will likely stay as is due to lack of funds, plus there's a fine line between helping out and being a busy body.

One of my pals.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...2da0bb6b_h.jpg

A lovely racoon!

https://www.thenational.ae/image/pol...$p$f$w=80f0658

The only reason that the possum didn't kill the chickens is because he couldn't catch them.

My Dad trained bird dogs. Every spring we bought a batch of quail and put them in recall pens similar to this. It's hard to tell from the pic but there is a wire funnel on the side, short story is that since quail are social birds and live in groups (a covey) you let a few out and the others call them back, they find the tunnel and come back into the pen. One or two don't come back but the rest do and can be used for training the dogs all summer....in the fall we'd turn them loose. Occasionally a snake would get into the pen and eat one or two quail but that was it. It was not a good day when I'd walk out to feed and water the quail and find a possum inside, they would kill every quail in the pen.

My dad had the problem of rats in his chicken house. He decided the answer was a pistol with .22 shorts. I'm not sure which was more concerning, that this was his answer or that he could actually hit a rat as it tried to run.

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Originally Posted by j44ke

Here in town though, the neighbors' chickens are an amusing form of TV. But the coop will likely stay as is due to lack of funds, plus there's a fine line between helping out and being a busy body.

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I hope that the grand reveal of this thread is that this all happened at your place in Manhattan.

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Originally Posted by gt6267a

A lovely racoon!

https://www.thenational.ae/image/pol...$p$f$w=80f0658

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Couldn’t that “thing” on his shoulder answer Jorn’s question about tree bark in another thread.

Mike

Look, I tried. But every time I read this thread title all I can think of is this:

Attachment 115148

I will compose
A fancy line
Or just plain prose
A song of praise
To you
Prairie Rose

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Originally Posted by davids

Look, I tried. But every time I read this thread title all I can think of is this:

Attachment 115148

I will compose
A fancy line
Or just plain prose
A song of praise
To you
Prairie Rose

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I am not alone.
First heard it in a bike shop, too.

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Originally Posted by lumpy

I am not alone.
First heard it in a bike shop, too.

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Today's Roxy Music Day at work.

So I have proclaimed!

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Originally Posted by mnoble485

Couldn’t that “thing” on his shoulder answer Jorn’s question about tree bark in another thread.

Mike

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Groot or maybe Groot ?

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Originally Posted by Scott G.

Groot or maybe Groot ?

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OT, but Guardians of the Galaxy has become a favorite in our house. I have no idea why. Groot is part of that though. We have trees on our property that are referred to as Groot.

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Originally Posted by davids

Today's Roxy Music Day at work.

So I have proclaimed!

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My special lady has to teach two lecture classes today but I have a brand new pandemic-ready pair of noise cancelling headphones so I am fully compliant:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZPmkrAXkcA