I have a young gold-laced wyandotte bantam hen that my nephew named Sandwich. She has been laying for about a month but recently she has been disappearing in the mornings only to turn up again in the afternoon. Today she has not turned up.
I keep my bantams in an enclosure surrounded by electric netting but they have started to fly over this to free range. In the end I let them out to free range while I am there during the day but Mr/s Fox is around and on the watch.
They were all there in the morning and I decided not to open up the netting because the weather was so horrible and they were all in the coop. Sandwich was not in the enclosure when I went down to check at about 2.00pm, nor was she in the coop.
I think she has been laying away but I have looked and not found any nests or nest sites. I couldn't find her this evening and though I looked around there was no sign. No feathers, blood or body parts. I am hoping against hope that she is brooding or roosting up in a tree but have a horrible feeling that she has fallen victim to a predator.
I feel really guilty as I should have made a higher enclosure before this and now I have to live with the consequences.