Can a dog eat a chick (approx 6 weeks) whole and leave no feathers or blood?

[FreeRangePamela]

We recently "rescued" a dog that had been abandoned at one point, so she may be acting more like a feral dog. Anyway, my husband caught her this morning with a baby chick -- when he called her name, she let the chick go. But two other chicks are completely missing without a trace. No feathers, no blood, nothing. Could the dog have eaten the chicks whole? (She is only around 40 lbs.) It seems the most likely explanation, but I want to explore all possibilities before blaming the dog. We are new to chickens and would welcome info from folks with more experience. Thanks in advance!

P.S. It probably goes without saying that we shouldn't have let the dog be unsupervised near the chicks, but that horse has left the barn...

 

[iwiw60]

Sorry for your loss, but now that your dog has a 'taste' for chickens (assuming he was the one that got it) ... he'll always and forever be on the lookout for a meal...

 

[FreeRangePamela]

Um... never mind. My husband tells me the two missing chicks have come back. He had searched high and low but they must have been hiding, and hiding well. So, that explains the no blood and no feathers, but the dog DID have a chicken, so we'll have to deal with that.

 

[FreeRangePamela]

Just seeing the response. Thank you. Well, since she didn't eat the chicks, we can hope she doesn't yet have a taste for chickens, but it's going to be awfully hard to train this dog, I think. Still, we can do better at supervising, at a minimum.

 

[TeePants]

I can tell you from experience that just because he didn't eat them doesn't mean he won't in the future. If he's gone after them once he's going to kill one eventually. Our pomeranian has managed to kill one of our hens recently. It's better to just keep them completely separate in the future if you can.

 

[KountryBoy15]

She probly buried it some place so she won't get in trouble again our dogs used to do that

 

[truegrit44]

Glad you found your chicks! We had a Jack Russell cross however that would eat whatever it killed. He was the best mouser and just scooped them up and swallowed them whole. Ate a baby bunny one time that was almost half grown.

When my chicks were bigger he didn't bother them totally trustworthy with my hens however...........we got 13 day old chicks at one point and had them in a big storage bin and I was afraid he'd maybe get them so we had them up on a table with heavy cover over them. He jumped up there and what I found was only 2 tiny heads in the bin!! He had eaten all of them and must have finally got full and left 2 pieces. Babies I guess were too much for him to ignore with running around and making peeping (mouse to him) sounds. I was really UPSET to say the least!! Got more and kept them locked in the bathroom, they grew up and he never bothered them till they died of old age.

 

[hugz4all4]

Glad you found your chicks!  We had a Jack Russell cross however that would eat whatever it killed.  He was the best mouser and just scooped them up and swallowed them whole.  Ate a baby bunny one time that was almost half grown.

When my chicks were bigger he didn't bother them totally trustworthy with my hens however...........we got 13 day old chicks at one point and had them in a big storage bin and I was afraid he'd maybe get them so we had them up on a table with heavy cover over them.  He jumped up there and what I found was only 2 tiny heads in the bin!!  He had eaten all of them and must have finally got full and left 2 pieces.  Babies I guess were too much for him to ignore with running around and making peeping (mouse to him) sounds.  I was really UPSET to say the least!!  Got more and kept them locked in the bathroom, they grew up and he never bothered them till they died of old age.

Oh my gosh I would of been horrified!

 

[ronikins]

I don't understand the whole "taste of blood" thing. My black lab/blue heeler mix killed a hen and mortally wounded my rooster when she was about a year old. With months of training, she doesn't have the slightest interest in them. She's almost 5 years old now and we have never had a problem with her since that day. She even turns and runs from our rooster when he instigates a fight.....

 

[iwiw60]

I don't understand the whole "taste of blood" thing. My black lab/blue heeler mix killed a hen and mortally wounded my rooster when she was about a year old. With months of training, she doesn't have the slightest interest in them. She's almost 5 years old now and we have never had a problem with her since that day. She even turns and runs from our rooster when he instigates a fight.....

While I understand and respect your thinking on this, your dog is definitely the exception to the rule. You have taken great efforts to re-train your dog and have had good results.