Will Raccoons Kill Your Backyard Chickens?

  When you come into a backyard that houses chickens, you first notice the soft noise in the background: cheep, cluck, occasional loud squawk and the flapping of wings. The chickens will move towards you, curious and naive. They’ll even let you pick them up if they trust you. Those who look after chickens say each bird has its distinctive personality, with most breeds making great pets. Back in 2011, the city of Milwaukee released an ordinance allowing backyard raising of chickens. The ordinance was said to be part of a larger initiative to change the consciousness of individuals particularly children about the source of our food. The ordinance also focused on connecting children to the natural world and creating a sustainable future through agriculture. Experts have reiterated the need to give children the opportunity to experience the cuddly and friendly disposition of one of nature’s most fascinating and productive animal. You just tend to have a natural fondness for them. Then again, this liking and care received by the chickens from people is rather the fatal opposite for animals who long to have them as their next meal. Milwaukee residents love their backyard chickens! But keeping the bird safe from predators includes protecting them from hawks, foxes and even raccoons. Raccoons are carnivorous and intelligent. Which means professional raccoon removal is your best option.

Will Raccoons Kill Your Backyard Chickens?

Although we view our chickens as anything but food and love to have them around, the rest of nature and its inhabitants do not seem to share our sentiments. In fact, carnivorous predators make chickens their top preference and primary target. Given the opportunity, predators like raccoons will devour chickens without any regret or consideration. Young chickens enjoy laying on bare floors at night and become easy targets for these hungry critters. Raccoons are quite intelligent and have nimble fingers – so your number one priority will be to make sure the locks on your coop are fixed or secured firmly, and cannot be easily figured out by raccoons or little children.

Signs Raccoons Are Attacking Your Chicken

The presence of their footprints should be the first sign of raccoons to look out for in your area. The tracks of raccoons are pretty distinctive and easy to identify, with five toes on the front paws and another five on the back paws. Also, you might notice the poop of the animal around your backyard. Unlike hawks, dogs, and coyotes, who carry their prey away, raccoons like to leave a message behind about their visitation. When a raccoon gets a hold on a free chicken meal, it will leave parts of chicken scattered around your front yard, coop, and your porch as well. Indeed, it’s an upsetting, unpleasant and gruesome site to come across, but it also gives fairly conclusive evidence of the damaging intrusion of raccoons to your backyard.

Consult Skedaddle Wildlife Services

If raccoons make it a routine to eat your farm chickens regularly, and this has become a serious poultry-keeping challenge for you, then calling the Skedaddle wildlife removal team should come to you as a strong consideration. If you keep backyard chickens, you must be vigilant to protect them from raccoons.  Skedaddle can assist with expert raccoon removal services. State laws vary and might not support people getting rid of predators by themselves, so do the proper research before coming to any conclusion on removing wildlife on your own. Raccoons can be very persistent when they sight something of interest and will go the lengths to get what they so desire. Once you noticed their destructive presence around your home, take the necessary preventive measures to protect your backyard chickens. A more effective approach would be to call the Skedaddle raccoon removal services to come help end their persistence.