Foxes

A while back, I had posted about setting a trap for raccoons. However, I have no trap ideas for foxes. We had several foxes visit our property a couple of years ago and then again this year. A couple of years ago we had several foxes: a grey one, yellow one, and red one. I don’t know if it was just those three foxes or more but they had the same color. This year it has been a red fox. I’m going to share my experience with you on what happened two years ago and then post a video at the bottom for the current fox we are dealing with. Hopefully it might help.

Two years ago, we started having chickens disappear. We never found any dead chickens or any tampering with the coops. There were no clumps of feathers anywhere. We came to the conclusion that during the day the predator was coming, but what predator? We just had a long battle with raccoons. Those attacks happened between dusk to dawn.

Before I go any further let me explain our coop situation. Since the raccoons wiped out most of our second batch of chickens, we took that coop and converted into a goat house for BB8 and Yoshi. Now all the chickens were in or on the same coop. On you ask? On top of the coop there is a large box that was put there for our rooster Henry. When we first got him, he wouldn’t go into the coop so finally Jacob made him a box and that’s where he stayed on top of the coop. After we lost our two rhode island roosters (Biggie and Middie) that’s when Henry started going into the coop. The box was then used as a nesting box during the day for the chickens when they free ranged.

After the raccoon attacks, our second batch of chickens started using Henry’s box or they merged with Henry’s flock. Little Roo and Speckles stayed in Henry’s box along with a few hens. There weren’t many chickens of the second batch left after the raccoon attacks. Fast forward, this was the situation: we had chickens in the coop and chickens on top of it. We had a second coop by the house with our third batch of young chickens and ducks. In the morning the chickens on top of the coop would free range early in the morning. Little Roo would even go visit the neighbor and crow at his door wanting food and yes my neighbor fed him, but I will post on the neighbor situation in a different post.

One ordinary afternoon we were getting task done. Chickens free ranged in the yard. All was calm until the chickens began squawking. When Jacob went to see what the fuss was about, Little Roo ran from the back of the property towards the house with a bright red fox hot on his heels. The fox stopped the pursuit when it saw Jacob and disappeared into the forest.

That’s when we knew we had a fox problem and why chickens were going missing. We started keeping Henry and his crew locked up until late afternoon. The other chickens were pretty good about staying in the yard while Henry sometimes liked to travel into the forest. Jacob and I would take turns watching the chickens, especially when there was squawking.

We had several more fox sightings after that. The most disturbing had been the time I was picking crab apples. We cut a large branch off the crab apple tree to be able to see our trail in the forest from the house. I decided I wanted to make crab apple jam. I will not be posting the recipe because mine turned out like laffy taffy! Awful. Anyway. The chickens were around me, pecking among the large branch too. All of a sudden the chickens were squawking and only a few feet away I catch a golden fox carrying off a black chicken. I yelled at the fox but it started to run, taking the chicken with it. I wish I had my rifle that day but left it in the house. I will never forget the sight of the fox nonchalantly having the chicken in it’s mouth while trotting away. I would like to also mention here that I had read before of another person that was enjoying the company of their chicken by their house and a fox jumped out of no where, snatching it. Sometimes foxes are not scared.

Pretty much after that the sightings stopped. We thought the foxes had moved on. Wrong. One early morning, about 5AM, I got up to start the day and made coffee. I remember I looked out the window and did not see one chicken. There were no chickens free ranging, there were none in the coop run area. No one was in sight. No crowing. Nothing. I went outside and saw the dreaded pile of feathers from Speckles.

All the chickens were accounted for that morning except for Little Roo. He had disappeared. I ended up finding a lot of his feathers by the coop and blood under our apple tree. He was found several hours later badly wounded.

About two nights later we caught a fox snooping around the chicken coop . We ended up putting baby monitors up and that was a significant help along with the lights around the coop. We placed the baby monitor transmitter outside the office window with the receiving end in the bedroom. There were nights I dreaded hearing the loud squawking but I knew the chickens needed up. The foxes came all hours.

One night we happened to see a gold fox at 11pm from our kitchen window. Later around 2AM that night we awoke to squawking to find a red fox sniffing at the coop entrance to the nesting box.

Since we didn’t have any traps set up for the foxes, we used the rifle. I had successfully shot one fox and not sure if I had made the shot on the second one. It’s important to make sure that the scope on the rifle is right so when it’s fired it will hit the target.

This went on for several months until finally the foxes stopped appearing. We brought home Hercules a month later and as he grew, he would do what I like to call patrolling the yard. Even though he has never seen a fox, I’m hoping that he chases the fox off when he does. Up until now, I thought his smell in the yard would deter any foxes. Obviously, his smell didn’t scare the fox we have seen this year.

There were some nights I would sprinkle ground cayenne pepper around the coops. Chickens don’t have the same effect to the pepper as mammals do. I don’t know if this had helped but you might be able to try it if you are having a fox or other predator problem where they are messing with the coop.

The current fox situation has stopped for now. The fox was visiting a few nights and the one night I waited for it, it never came back. I’m still checking the security cameras at night to see if it’s coming back. We have had the chickens during the day squawking, but I’m not sure if it’s the fox or something else. All we can do is keep an eye out for now. We have lost two rhode island chickens since our buttercup chicken had disappeared. Which if you watch the video, then I’m talking about the buttercup chicken.