It started out sad and then got ridiculous and now it's a bit sad again.
First off, I let the chickens into the yard the other day like I often do but then I forgot to close the door behind them when they went in at night. Jeremiah came home when they were already in their coops but forgot to close them in too. Around 10pm we remembered and he went out to close them in. He looked inside and couldn't find most of the chickens! So he called for me and together we searched the yard and trees with flashlights. Sometimes if they don't go in, they're hanging in the trees near their coop. They always come home to roost.
We counted 4 in the coops and couldn't find any more. So we had to just close them in and go back inside. We were sad and felt guilty.
The next morning they were my first thought when I woke up and I was out there at 7:30am looking for chickens. I found one pacing the gate, hoping to get in. She spent the night somewhere else and wanted to come home. Now we're up to 5.
Then I found one in the front yard on the right hand side, kind of hiding behind the pine tree. She was moving slowly and I sensed some injuries as she left a trail of feathers behind her. But she's still around so we're up to 6.
Then I heard the female duck quacking in the neighbor's yard on the left hand side and realized that she was behind a long fence and couldn't figure her way around. The ducks think they're chickens and still haven't figured out that they can fly. She was with another chicken. So that's 7 chickens and one duck.
I called Jeremiah out to help me catch the duck amidst the barbed wire, holly leaves, and poison ivy. We finally got her home but I would have been ok if she had just gone into the wild with other ducks. Instead, she just wanted to come back to the flock.
And even sadder, I can't find her partner- the one-eyed male duck (who lost his eye last winter in a fight against a predator while defending the flock). I think he was the front line of defense and the first to go. The female duck is sad. There's no other way to describe it. She's physically fine but you can tell she's sad.
I walked the neighborhood and the woods to try to find more. Instead, I found lots of feathers in batches and trails. Very CSI.
Later that day the cool old guy neighbor whose yard backs up against the chicken coop came for a visit on his scooter (he's 89!). He told me how a neighbor banged on his door in the late morning to complain about his chicken. Another neighbor had complained to them about the chicken bc it was getting all the dogs barking. The neighbors just kept passing the complaints down until it reached him and he said he'd catch it and put it back. He was the only one who knew where the chicken lived (and obviously they were wrong- it wasn't his chicken). The other neighbor was afraid the chicken would bite. People are crazy.
But now we have 8 chickens and one duck. This time last week we had 11 chickens and 2 ducks. So it's quite a loss. At first I was eager to buy more chicks but Jeremiah convinced me that the flock was still big enough to last another year with careful care, despite the general predator-induced attrition rate.
Other deaths that day:
* I discovered that the herb garden was munched to death by the chickens during their day out. Doh.
* The cat caught and killed a mouse.
* The cat caught and killed a baby bunny.
Geez.
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