Any mink trappers out there?

[85_Ranger4x4]

Got any hints on how to catch one?

He has wiped out my ducks and put a big dent in my chicken herd. 6 ducks and 10 hens. Usually he hits once and leaves me alone for awhile, he has visited four nights in a row this week and came back once during the day while I was at work.

Tried a chicken breast nailed in a wooden box with a snap trap, he took the breast last night (but finally left my birds alone) but didn't set off the trap.

I am thinking about maybe a head mount, I have been fighting this POS ninja rat for a year now.

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

Asked my uncle who used to do a ton of trapping last night, he was baffled they would bother chickens (usually muskrats and fish) but he said put a can of sardines in a livetrap and cover the trap with square bales so it doesn't look like a live trap. So I did:

I really wanted to get the sardines with hot sauce so he could enjoy that while he waited for me but I didn't...

But of course before he went in the trap he killed every bird we had left. 24 birds in 4 days, 9 last night.

 

[Die.Fledermaus]

My neighbor has a small dairy goat operation, free range chickens, very rural outskirts/outside of town. Regular visits from Crows, Coyote, Opossum, Skunk and at least one Cougar are the normal.
Chicken losses, very few maybe 1 every couple of months. Although the Crows are repeat offenders on eggs. I think what keeps the looses so low are the LGDs.
There are only two at the moment (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maremma_Sheepdog) and they both aquired at very young so they grew up in yard/field/barns and have had no training.
I'm very impressed, sometimes when I visit I will find them guarding an egg (the chickens are not real smart and tend to leave them everywhere). I don't think they know why they are doing that, nor do they mind that any human takes them. They also provide space heating services for baby goats, a place for a little older goats to play king of the mountain (ugg) on.
The draw back, I think they costed about 400$ each with I'm told is a bargain.

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

I don't like them around but I haven't had a problem with racoon or possums bothering the birds at all.

This POS ninja rat mink though, if he wanted in he got in. They only need a 1" hole and they can burrow like nobody's business. My 100+ year old chicken coop has a dirt floor, he would rip the boards to make a hole (like the mice have on cartoons) or burrow under something.

Night 1 - pushed the door (with a cement block leaning against it) that goes into the chicken run up an inch and burrowed under it.

Night 2 - Burrowed under walk in door. Tried to burrow under the wall first but he gave up.

Night 3 - Burrowed under and came up under the laying boxes.

Night 4 - tore a hole in the back wall. Got pics on game camera and discovered it was not a weasel.

Night 5 - I didn't fix his hole in the back wall so he could get to the two live traps I had in there. I also had two more outside, all loaded with sardines. He wasn't impressed with the offerings in that side apparently (there are two rooms, I had the birds shut in the other room with the door between barricaded with bricks so he ripped another hole in the wall to kill all survivors before getting caught in the trap near the hole going into the other side.

I guess mink attacking chickens is on the rise, none of the old timers I have asked about it have ever heard of a mink doing this, just weasels.

 

[91stranger]

we had one big mink kill 9 barred rock chickens, full grown male and female turkey, bunch of bantams and rabbits. they are very very VERY hard to trap. body traps work the best. They wont go into a live trap. We finally caught ours in a leg trap and I shot it with a 4.10 in the barn. he eluded my traps for weeks before I finally heard him screaming in the barn, ran and got the gun and got him. That was the hardest thing I ever to get. best bet is to try to narrow his options for getting in. they can get in holes the size of a quarter.