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Sounds like something a corvid would do. We have them around but they appear to keep to themselves.
Crows Kill Chicken
I had 2 crows kill a 4 week old Cornish Cross chick today. He was not small. Certainly larger than some bantams.
Yes, I caught them in the act. I'm not blaming them just because they were in the neighborhood. I also know they broke and ate a dozen goose eggs this spring, as well as stealing feed.
I sure wish I knew of a way to get rid of them.
Anyway, just a warning if you've got smallish (but not all that small) chickens and there are crows around.
Sounds like something a corvid would do. We have them around but they appear to keep to themselves.
I'd rather have crows than hawks. I toss out unhatched or infertile eggs to encourage them. Young birds are kept penned.
I used to bait crows with eggs too! A few times the poor crow would pay too much attention to the bait egg and one of my pair of Red tailed Hawks would get a free meal. I once was neutral in the war between the crows and the hawks, but that was before a Murder of crows mobbed my setting goose for her eggs. Frankly the goose was getting beat badly untill I joined in with a broom. She had knocked down 3 crows that I finished off for her. She was badly pecked on the head and I thought she would lose an eye. All the eggs were lost with about a week to go before they would have hatched.
GD, that is terrible to have happened to your goose and her eggs.
I had problems with a raven this spring. It tried several days to catch my young chickens. The hens that hatched them pulled some tricks of their own and saved all their chicks. A couple of times I heard the commotion and went out to see what was going on and helped by chucking rocks at the raven.
Both crows and ravens would enjoy a meal of chicken. One spring I lost a chick to a magpie. Crows work in groups. Ravens mostly work alone.
The chickens are supposed to be on pasture during the day, but I've been afraid to let them out. That means that the covered pen they are in is too small for all of them.
So I just moved half of them into my shade house.
Yesterday, I watched a crow circle just above the shade house, studying it for quite a long time. He then sat on top of the tree right next to the shade house to study it. He didn't leave until I threatened to shoot him.
So, I'm thinking that it still isn't safe to let the chickens out.
I had moved my goose with new goslings into the covered dog kennel and I've seen the crows sitting and staring at those goslings.
The dogs let themselves in and out of the kennel through a dog dog, which gives the poor goose a hissy fit. She's threatening to rip their faces off and they completely ignore her. A balance of power, that is.
Can't the goose work the dog door? Maybe she knows that the goslings can't.
Maybe she knows the goslings are safe in the dog kennel from the crow.
The dog door is small and to get to it, she would have to go up a steep tunnel. The dog door is at the top of the stem wall in the garage and the ramp to get to it is enclosed.
It's my experience that birds don't like to push aside a curtain, so I'm not so sure that a goose would figure out a dog door. It just looks like a wall. If she gets into the garage and then through the next dog door into the house, it will make for a good story.
I just put 2 little turkeys out there with her, and it won't surprise me if they get through the dog door and into the house. Those two are a couple of lively troublemakers.
The Mom Goose has a little zone around the goslings and the turks learned that in about 2 seconds, but I will still need to spend the day watching them to make sure they can't squeeze out of some small space in the fencing. The kennel was built to protect small dogs, not hold snoopy little turkeys.
"birds" is a pretty broad term, My experience has shown that our Muscovys had no problems with curtains, We uaed to use curtains on some nest boxes in our mixed chicken-muscovy coop when I lived in EVY'S part of the frozen North. The muscovy hens seemed to always use these 'private' nests. Being the cold north the ducks liked to go outside if the pond wasn't frozen so they could bathe (The chickens liked to just use their dust boxes) We had a sort of home made doggy door (old carpet hanging over the opening to keep the wind and snow out) A spring hatched duck would sit and wait for a old duck to use the door at first but they quickly learned how to use them. On the inside we had a wooden panel that we used to prevent 'night visitors' Didn't use them when I moved South, but I did notice that my geese really didn't like to 'duck' under anything. They refused to use the first house until I got wise and made the door taller.
That was how the ducks would get away from a mad goose they would duck under the low board of a 3 board horse fence but the geese wouldn't.
It seams that lots of things are individual to different species of birds or different birds. My chickens readily go through a curtain with strips at one corner for them to enter easier. This is so they can range and keep sparrows out of their building. The ducks have the same situation in their duck house and they are having a harder time learning to use it. The geese come and go just like it isn't there. They entered the hen house shortly after I hung the curtain. Food seamed to give the geese sufficient reason to overcome any fear of the hanging strings entering the hen house.
I haven't had problems with crows or ravens in this area, although something pulled onion sets out of the ground in the garden up at the farm. I think maybe that could have been rabbits. We do have hawks and owls both here and at the farm.
We moved a young Anatolian female to the farm last week and today she got the run of the place. It will be interesting to see the change in varmit presence.
My ducks have accepted the curtain very well. It just took a few days of having to go through it to get to their food. I did force (herded) them in there two times to give them the idea that they could go through the one inch strips of black mesh cloth. One duck, a hen, that seams to be the leader came and went easily. Finally they started following her. Now they just stick their beaks through a slit and in they go. The longest slit is about 8" above the threshold of the door.
My Anatolian male has been a problem with any loose birds at night. Only the geese are respected by him, also, they are all smart enough to go into their pen at night. I am getting an electric collar this week. We will see if it educates him to leave all the birds alone. If so he gets to keep his happy home. Otherwise I will be in search of a farmer or rancher that needs a livestock guardian dog.
Mary,
Sorry to hear your male isn't bird safe. Those E collars can really change a dog's attitude, though. Good luck!
Um, good luck with that if your shock treatment does not work out. You might have a tough time finding a taker for a livestock guard dog which kills livestock, even species as far removed from hoofstock as birds. Prey drive is prey drive, it doesn't make much difference the subject.Originally Posted by Mary
My opinion: no dog is safe with birds until it has been carefully trained to understand that the birds are the property of the human and are to be protected just like the rest of the property.
There is no such thing as a dog that is born safe with birds. Some understand faster when it is explained to them, but all of them need the training and even a trained dog, I won't leave them unattended with poultry.
My little pound puppy was three years old when she met her first birds. She was never been a problem with them until she saw the Anatolian chasing one and she took it up. I scolded her to no avail. I caught her giving chase and gave her a firm kick to the rump followed by a severe scolding. She got the message and has never bothered them again. My husband's dog had been around geese and never bothered. She came here and never has bothered any species of birds. Then she got attacked by my oldest goose. She retaliated as any dog that was attacked would with barking and snapping. The geese wised up and leave her alone and she doesn't bother any of them. Even the attacking hens with chicks she just steps out of their way. I grew up with a farm dog that helped me heard nearly 3000 chickens every afternoon. He never chased or harmed them. Titus, the Anatolian, is just very strong willed and I am not physically strong enough to do a good physical job of control. If I catch him and tell him to drop them he does. The problem has been at night when they are out when they were supposed to be penned up. He discovers them moving around at first light, they start to run and you know the rest of the story. Neither my pound dog, my husband's or the farm dog had any training. Some dogs just seam to understand without training.
It appears that the crows got into it with my Swedish drakes.
The crows have been stealing the Swedish eggs every day. But I woke up to a lot of cawing and a whole lot of duck ruckus. I ran out to the run to see crows disappearing into the distance and a whole lot of black crow feathers , including flights, in my run.
My guess is that the crows decided that they could kill a duck. The Swedish ducks aren't too much bigger, visually, than the chickens the crows killed.
I've seen the Swedish drakes working in formation, like a wolf pack. They aren't aren't passive ducks. I hope the crows took a lesson away from that.
Mighty Ducks eh?
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