Cats and coons and foxes.

[farmboy]

The cat numbers have all but disappeared on the farm. I had around fifteen cats this summer and I am down to one. I let her into the house normally they are barn cats but she needs protection. Anyhow my question is this do racoons eat cats? I think I may have some in the yard. Do foxes eat cats? Could either one even catch a cat?

[gitano]

Foxes eat cats. 'Coons don't.

Paul

[farmboy]

Interesting thank-you I would have thought the other way around. I should go get my predator caller and see if I can get the fox I saw at harvest time.

[gitano]

I'm sure 'coons have taken more than one cat, but cats are mostly too fast for 'coons. While 'coons are certainly 'bad', AND they're certainly big enough to take a cat, they're just not fast enough unless they can surprise the cat. Maybe 'coons found a place to ambush your cats, but otherwise, foxes are notorious as cat-killers.

Paul

[farmboy]

We never have really had many foxes around here. Dad always said when you had coyotes you had no foxes. The last five years I have been on a serious coyote reduction program. To the point the last two years I have not heard coyotes howling at night first time in my life time I have not heard them. Anyhow I saw a fox running across my lane one night when I was coming in from the field. So I guess I have some of them. I have only shot a handful of them over my life time. Once a den at a graveyard where they were living in the graves and another den I found another time and that is my total fox hunting experience. So not even sure where to look for them in the winter.

[gitano]

Coyotes are even bigger cat-eaters.

Paul

[farmboy]

They were relatively shy about coming to the yard. I perhaps made a mistake getting rid of them all. I had a great horned owl pair that cleaned the cats at three farmers yards mine being one of them. The owl finally got hit flying across the highway and I could keep cats in the yard again. That is what upsets me about losing the cats no cats around the yard equals way to many mice and all the out building s smelling like mode ***.

[gitano]

Owls are also great cat-killers.

Paul

[farmboy]

I had a guy tell me to mix moth balls in come and set that out for the coons. He said they would not be able to go ten feet before they were dead. They are attracted to the sweetness of the come and the moth balls poison them. He had a couple die at the bowl he put out and another was about three feet away.

[gitano]

I like 'coons a lot, and probably couldn't get myself to poison them. In fact, I don't care for poisoning things very much at all. Except insects. And maybe politicians.

Paul

[farmboy]

Some politicians are poison. Lol.

[farmboy]

Owls are also great cat-killers.

Paul

Bingo! I think that is the problem the last two nights there has been a pair of great horned owls in the yard over night. I put my one remaining cat inside at night to make sure I have one left. I should ask the nieghbors if there cat population is going down as well. We are likely all feeding the owls.

[gitano]

Especially Great Horned owls!

Paul

[buckshot roberts]

I have had coon problem for sometime, never lost a cat to them,  I have two cats missing now, and they where some tuff cats,  got to checking to see if they may have been hit by a car, two days ago saw a coyote in the back field.

[sakorick]

I'm an Owl lover nonetheless.......esp the GHO. Better to eat house cats than Quail!

[gitano]

Oh I like owls. A lot more than I like cats. My personal favorite owl is the barn owl. Has a cool scientific name too - Tyto alba. My favorite animal scientific name belongs to the Hoopoe - Upupa epops. Pronounced "oo poopa ee pops". Love that name.

Owls are a lot like sharks though. They're basically dumb as a box of rocks, BUT... they do ONE thing REALLY WELL. Sharks are amazing predators, and so are owls. It's ironic that owls have a reputation as "wise", when in fact, they are about as trainable as cats. No joke. It's why you only very rarely see owls in "bird shows". Usually whatever they do is VERY simple.

Paul

[farmboy]

I will see if I can get a picture of these two owls. Something else I came across a couple of days ago about four miles west of me I saw what I thought was a raven sitting on a post. Shouldered the rifle to take a look and low and behold it was a bald eagle. I think that is what it was. Certainly an eagle with the white head. I think it was a small one not much bigger in body size than the post and perhaps it stood about sixteen inches tall. It flew away and had a large wing span. I was wishing at the time that I had a zoom lens on my phone camera. I quite love all birds of prey. I had what we would call a sparrow Hawks come into the yard a few years ago. By the time they left there were no more birds singing they got every sparrow and ever starling. The yard was dead quite for the first time in my life.

[sakorick]

I think it was a small one not much bigger in body size than the post and perhaps it stood about sixteen inches tall.

Well, That's about 1/2 of a mature Baldy's size....must have been something else.

[gitano]

There are small bald eagles. If it had a white head and dark body, it was a bald eagle. There are no other birds with white heads and dark bodies in North America. "Post" for size and "16 inches" are relative measures with a certain amount of 'wiggle room'.

Paul

[sakorick]

It is my understanding that the "small" Bald Eagles are a Southern USA bird and they are still 30" high standing. Perhaps Farmboy can get a picture of him and I say him as male Baldies are smaller than females. I had one in my back yard 2 weeks ago but by the time I got my camera chipped up he/she vanished!:Banghead:

[JaDub]

What Paul said.  Owls can crush just about anything in their talons.