Polecats -Argghhhh

As I drove out of my drive today I saw a baby polecat. which means there will be more. This is a problem for my hens, chicks and eggs as polecats will take all of those if they can. They also climb so any pens need to be roofed, unfortunately at the moment non of mine are. So guess how this coming weekend will be spent?

The good news is that polecats will also kill and eat snakes, and this week my son also had a run in the a very large (1.5mt) black snake, as I did not see it I am unable to identify it. But again this was close to our hen pen, and a snake can get thorough the wire walls. They will take eggs without a second thought, although they have to be very hungry to take a hen.

The picture above shows an adult polecat, of the same colouring as the one I spotted today. It is very rare to see polecats as normally they are nocturnal. I can only assume this was a baby who had been told to leave home.