Hi Irishdave, Sorry for your losses - yes it really, really sucks. I understand about wanting revenge!! I know exactly how you feel. We have all had this awful experience at one time or another. We have all learned from our mistakes and from others on this forum. It could have been anything. I had a far away neighbors dog come to my house one day and killed almost 20 young pullets - I was only gone about 30 minutes - some of the heads were missing and could not account for at least 4. Needless to say I found out who the dog belonged to and boy did they pay. I also had a problem with weasels they were dispatched too, the weasel got inside my coop through a 2-3"gap in the coop along the base of the wall where the floor meets the wall, In the middle of the night.(heads missing, some maimed, some just gone, some stuck in the whole where it got in. Has been repaired since. I have seen all kinds of preditors, could have been a possum,coon,fox coyote, do you keep your girls in a coop or do you let them stay out at night? I lock mine up at night and they do not get let out until it is full daylight. You could put out live traps and see what you get. I know you said they were all over the place - but were they in the coop or outside. Once you get chickens you will find out exactly who and what your preditors are. If you are letting them roost in trees at night my suggestion would be to lock them in the coop at night and make sure it is preditor proof. Leaving them out all night is just going to cause you heartache and money. I am soooo sorry for your loss. I have been there twice and I was sick at heart and mad as hell.

There is one other place I know of you are likely to read about composting animals. The humanure handbook website forum. It wasn't till I started humanure composting that I learned how to get a really good hot compost pile that would easily handle rotting carcass and control smell and other animals digging it up. So what have we composted. I really can't even count the bones and scraps of animals we have eaten since we always compost all food scraps that don't go to the chickens or worm bins. It is a firm rule here to avoid putting anything stinky in the trash can. So, animal bodies in our compost bin lately. 3 sick chickens we didn't want to make the rest of the flock sick. Any dead squirrels we find around the house. 12 rats we caugh And all fish parts that the chickens don't get, I've found that burying fish parts causes critters to dig up the yard or whatever plant I put over it so composting seems to be the best way for use to take care of it. I agree that this is an advanced composting thread. No one who is not confident of their ability to manage a hot compost pile should be putting dead bodies in it.

A stag beetle, Lucanus. Don't know which species are found in your part of the world. Tucker

Tough to be sure from that photo. It looks like it is some sort of native rodent, not a Black/Brown Rat. The membrane in front of the hind legs makes me think it is a baby Flying Squirrel. Does that membrane attach to the front legs as well?