Late this winter, our poultry was massacred by a single fox, leaving us with a lone—male—duck. My wife and I were too busy with our newborn son, her mother’s aneurysm, and my work for the White House to launch a proper defense and counter-assault on the fox. (Though I did start a few mornings by chasing after the little bastard, swinging a shotgun and screaming at him, to no effect.) Yesterday we got a few new hens—two pekins and a blue indian runner:
The indian runner is pretty ridiculous. I keep being impressed by how she’s learned to walk on just her two hind legs…only to remember that’s all that any duck has. They should start laying this summer. Next up: a few new chickens.
Maybe you should get a llama. Does that work with poultry?
“Omigosh, it’s walking!!!”
*blink*
“Oh… oh, I guess that’s what they do.”
I suppose there’s no video footage of said running, screaming, and waving of the shotgun.
Tall guys who do that look *great* on camera.
“I’ll blast you, you gol-danged varmint!”
I would pay good money for that video footage, Adam.
*insert joke about liberals not knowing how to use guns*
:-D
Have you done anything to prevent further depredation?
The source of the problem initially was when we had some icy snow in the late winter. It weighed down our electromesh fences and prevented them from carrying a current. The fox could traipse right over the fence and eat whatever he wanted. Solution: It’s not snowing. :)
An added problem was our chicken pasture being just a year and a half old (we seeded it shortly after we built the house), it has some big areas with only light amounts of grass, which is to say that they’re really nothing but clay. So after rain (or snow), the ground gets too soft to hold up our electromesh posts, and they collapse. Solution: Grow more, denser grass.
Finally, I found that our fence batteries weren’t producing as much current as they had been. Solution: Bought new batteries.
I like the assessment/solution style of your response. Good luck with the new gals.
And now, off to research electromesh.