dead peasants

Got a call today about something killing peasants in a pen guy said there was supposed to be 2000 birds in the pen and there is now between 1300 and 1400 also the dead birds are either missing there head or just killed and left alone, impossible to tell if some were eaten. What do you guys think would do this? Thanks for the help

Cossacks, definitely. The only thing I know that has killed peasants in recent memory.

I hope you mean pheasants, lol. Sounds like a weasel to me.

Lol thought it looked funny that's what I get for trusting spell check

I would say weasel as well.

6 or 7 hundred birds sounds like there is more than one animal involved. Maybe a mink is having a contest with a weasel and they're keeping score.

Yep, I was gonna say you worked them too hard out in the fields...LOL

Don't be so quick to blame the weasel...

I trapped the largest Pheasant farm/hunting preserve in the county I live in.
30,000 birds.
The biggest killer of young pheasant and quail ?

Norway Rats !

And they kill and feed just the same as a weasel and mink !

I don't know if they were Norway, but my cousin had these huge rats in his chicken house, he had to get rid of his chickens. Not only would they kill some to eat, but I bet some animals might get killed by diseases carried by rats.

yoteman - Definitely would go with the others on the idea of smaller predators that are efficient including the weasels and the rats, but if hundreds are dead in a very short period of time, I'd also be looking at those that don't look damaged (ie, no obvious blood signs or beheading) even if must pluck them to look for damage. Pheasants can die of other things and though predation is always logical, owner shouldn't rule out some natural related mortality. Game birds can be very intolerant and less than hardy. The beheaded ones obvious speak to some killing, weasel bites can be small and nearly undetectable, but would be worth checking in my opinion.

We had chickens on my grandparents farm I grew up on and I remember weasels doing a number every few years and it was often multiple kills in a night.

Impressive member of the weasel family, those little guys pound for pound are impressive considering the native and domestic prey they can take down.

Thanks for the help

Does the pen have a top to keep them in and predators out if so ypu need to find the entry and work on it. I did a flight pen for quail. Everynight 7 or 8 birds were killed near the net that had 4 electric fence lines 6 in off ground was the first and evry 6 in up. It ended up being coons. They would find the covie sleeping close to the net get very low under the first wire grab a quail pull him to the net with the end result being a head missing and the neck sticking thru de feathered and knarled up.
He had a smaller pen of pheasants years later and something was killing 6 or 7 a night chewing the necks badly and going to another ocasionally it ate part of a bird probably after the killings. He thouhgt sometimes some birds were taken. In this case I found an entry, positive set it and caught a opossum.
He has an area 18 in off the ground with wooden skirting and 1/2 in wire for a floor. For maintenance I cut an opening in the skirting, installed a wooden cubby for a tunnel and a 160 conibear at the end. I put the cubby in backwards so it is 18 back and put a lip covering about 1/2 of it so it is [impossible]for a dog or child to access and it is not accessable to the public.
Thru the years he has caught numerous opossums, coons, feral cats and one mink.

As long as we are talking about pheasants, my all time favorite game bird, ( how can you miss a bird that big and that slow ) It's

easy, they make so much noise that your gun is empty before it hits your shoulder. Here is my favorite pheasant pen story; (If

you've heard it before, it's perfectly alright to skip this post) I got called to a hunt club where all they found of their birds

is a bunch of feathers on the ground. I would be lying if I told you that I solved the problem. What they had was a pair of

probably, Great Horned owls working in unison. One of the pair would swoop over the cages and the other one would catch a pheasant

that got too excited and flew into the top net. The second owl would swoop and grasp the bird and calmly pull it through the

netting piece by piece. I informed the hunt club that they could get a permit, which they did, and all of the rest were saved. I

never got paid a nickel but I had a terrific pheasant hunt, free of charge. ( You can't weigh everything in dollars and cents )

I'm calling the IRS I think you traded services!

I'm with LTon rats. Pheasants spook very easy so if there's a top broken necks could very easily be to blame on the dead with no sighns of trauma. Another possibility this time of year is coccidiossis with rats feasting on the dead. Female mink with a litter or just the litter would be another suggestion. Obviously without being there to see it this is all a guess.

A detailed body inspection of bite marks, heads missing etc could be a couple of things going on at the same time. Game bird farms attract several predators. Birds and mammals alike. The game farms I have worked over the years we found with heavy mortality it turned out to be mink, weasel or coon. If they are under a canopy shelter that should protect them from owls and hawks.

I am going with mink as the problem. An inspection of the area around the fence and the lay of the land should help with finding some sign and entry points. Trail cam placements at a few key suspected points will help greatly if you are unable to make a call thru the forensic evidence left at the scene.