Ever since i integrated the pullets into the chicken pen the chickens had been bullying the newbies, as chickens do. The pullets, afraid of the chickens, roosted each night in between the tarp covered fence of the pen and the side of the chicken coop. I kept telling them they’d get stuck here and predators could grab them and pull them through the fence or break their necks etc. i’d shoo them away from the fence each night and each night they’d defy me and go right back once i’d left. One particular night i was having a time and a half with Cashew. She seemed to be hearing something i could not, or she may have just finally cracked and lost her marbles. She kept me up all night doing a low volume mini bark, trying to alert me to something outside without announcing her presence to whatever was out there. She drove me crazy. Each time i’d get up and put on my shoes, my pants, and my head lamp. I’d hurry her onto the leash and take her out. Not only would i not see or hear anything but silence. She would immediately return to the porch and request to be let in. She wasnt interested in whatever she seemed to be trying to tell me about. I yelled at her for waking me and then not producing any emergency. Her eyes got wide and she slinked up the steps low to the ground with her ears back. She looked surprised that i was making noise and she wanted to go in the house, leaving me behind. I took us both in the house and i stopped investigating when she low barked. I decided she was the boy who cried wolf.
The following morning at 2 am i was dead tired. I dragged myself out of bed and began getting the animals’ breakfasts ready. When i opened the door to let the dogs out potty i heard a chilling noise that i recognized from a previous year on the homestead. Mountain lion mating call. Close. Not our property but the neighbor’s. I decided they had to be allowed to potty so i waved them into the dog run quietly. I stood out there and listened to the call over and over while waving at them to hurry up and potty. It was not getting any louder. It was probably stationary at the moment. As soon as they both finished peeing i quietly opened the gate and waved the dogs to the porch. I closed the gate and the dogs spent the rest of the morning in the house while i got ready for work. I left both dogs and the cat locked in the house that day, as i left for work before dawn. I wasnt sure where she had gone or if she had found a mate. If she had they’d be spending up to 13 days together before parting ways. If she hadn’t she could cause enough trouble by herself. With one for sure and possibly teo mountain lions in the area, the dogs were in the house. The following days i simply left at dawn instead of before, to ensure the safety of the chickens and dogs in the dark.
I had been so worried about the mountain lion and the dogs i hadnt really thought about ringtails, foxes, or raccoons. I mean i do worry about those regularly but i hadnt been on this day. I was a little preoccupied. When i left for work an hour before dawn all 9 birds were alive. When i came home i could see two wings and a leg sticking out from the side of the pen from behind the tarp where the pullets usually roost. I could tell from the car that the chicken was on its back with a leg and two wings pulled through the fence. I knew it wasnt alive. Upon further inspection it was really very stuck. Its neck was broken. Both wings were broken. There was a small hole near the vent where something had tried to chew it but couldnt get through the fence. There were some feathers strewn around that had been ripped out in the scuffle. Both wings were pulled all the way through the small rectangular fence slats and i had to rebreak the wings to get them back through. I tried to unwedge it with a branch but it was really really stuck. it took about 45 minutes for me to work her free. I had to push the wings back through, try to budge her, and then ultimately twist a leg around backwards so i could grab it from the front side of the coop even though it was meant to be facing the other way, and pull her out by the leg. I was confused about how she had gotten so thoroughly stuck. The pullets usually roosted there because they could fit and the chickens could not. She was so dang stuck it took me 45 minutes to free her. She was cold but she was not yet stiff. Her body was limp and floppy. Poultry lice and beetles crawled between the feathers. The ants were not yet interested which told me she had taken her last breath recently. It was a disturbing thought to me but whatever tried to eat her either tried to pull her through the fence recently or before dawn and it just took her this long to die. She had very minimal bleeding from a very small wound. It would seem the broken bones or the stress of the matter were more likely the things that killed her. With both wings through the fence i didnt have to wonder if she had died of illness or disease. A critter had got her. No autopsy necessary. I put her in a trash bag and put her in the freezer until i could make a decision about whether i was well enough to dig a hole through limestone or she was going to the landfill. Because she was where the pullets always roost at night i assumed she must be a pullet. Because she was so big i thought she could only be Sophie or Georgie. Georgie was a notoriously loud very loving pullet who had a sweet place in my heart. Sophie was the meanest of the pullets who had developed a jealous streak like daisy. Anytime i petted another chicken or pullet she saw red. Unlike daisy she wouldnt go after the other chicken, she’d go after me. She’d grab skin in her beak and thrash her head about wildly, drawing blood most times. She wouldnt let go until you kicked or punched her. I learned that the hard way as many times i just waited for her to tire herself out and got pretty injured. Now i give her a quick jab in her side and she lets go. Well, to test who it was i got in the pen and petted some chickens. Sophie came right up and grabbed the skin between my knuckles on my left hand, thrashing about wildly and taking a nice chunk of skin with her when i jabbed her and she ran off. It was not Sophie. I hung my head. Poor Georgie. My poor sweet vocal Georgie with a bird call that sounded like a sick banshee. Not Georgie. But it must have been Georgie, because sophie and georgie were the only two pullets big enough to be this dead corpse and Sophie was obviously still alive and biting. I moped about the rest of the week. I wedged cardboard and pieces of wood where the pullets used to roost and i caught each pullet and threw it into the coop and then stood in front of the doorway sliding the metal door on the track every night, making sure nobody slept outside the coop anymore. I was determined not to lose any more chickens. I had 6 pullets. I gave away two. I now lost one. I had only 3 hand raised pullets to show after the last 6 months. I needed to supplement the flock with young layers as the older chickens reached menopause. My plan was disintegrating.
One day i had an epiphany. I had been rounding up and throwing 4 pullets into the coop at night. if i had been rounding up and throwing 4 birds into the coop at night it would mean they all had to be pullets since the chickens go in by themselves. I stared at the pen. There were four light brown birds (sun bleached) on one side and four dark brown birds (pullets) on the other side. The dead bird had to be a grown chicken, not a pullet, but which one? There was daisy with her floppy comb. There was Rosie with her crooked feet. Lily and Oakley kind of looked alike. I wasnt sure who was who at this point. Wait a minute. Where was Ellis, the chicken with the partially bald head due to scar tissue after her tbi when 25 chickens from another flock pecked a hole in her head and reopened it constantly for a month before i took her back and nursed the wound closed with time and blue salve to keep the other chickens from pecking at it? She wasnt anywhere. I looked and looked. There was no half bald chicken in that pen. I opened the bag in the freezer. The bald side of her head had been facing down towards the dirt. I hadnt noticed it but now that i flipped her over i realized the chicken in the bag in the freezer was Ellis. What on earth was Ellis doing in that spot?! She was a HUGE chicken, rivaled only by Rosie, the biggest chicken. No wonder she was so stuck. The pullets roosted there because the chickens couldn’t fit. For the life of me i cant fathom how Ellis ended up in the pullet roosting spot, but it is definitely her in the freezer. She did have a habit of flying and screaming whenever anyone or anything happened. Maybe a raccoon came and she just flew in any direction and flew right into a tight spot she couldnt get out of and then a coon pulled her wings through the fence while she screamed and panicked. Ellis was a tbi patient. She did a lot of screaming and wild erratic flying. Georgie was alive and well. My Georgie had been in the pen the whole time. It was Ellis that had died. Poor Ellis had had a rough life. She didnt get along with any other chickens and most of them pecked her. She spent all her time stress eating and screaming and flying. She was a good layer but she wasnt having a very well adjusted life. I felt that she deserved a proper burial but i just got over the flu and now i appeared to be coming down with the other strain of flu in our building. I would leave her in the freezer for the moment and just see how quickly i recovered and whether i could dig her a proper hole.