Dolavim.us

We’ve about decided we are dealing with an avian predator, ie: hawk, falcon or especially owl. I suspect it is one still learning what it can and can’t haul off. In that sense maybe it’s less of a pointless, wasteful loss. These predators, once skilled hunters, might eat a few thousand pesky rodents a year. In the meantime we’ve been adding overhead protection for the run. And we started looking at when replacement chicks might be available. That turns out to be today.

We got Blue Andalusian, Buff Orpington, Silver Lace Wyandotte, and Ameraucana. I think they’re roughly a week old.

Bossy and Cuckoo are dead. Same M. O. and still no obvious sign of canine entry to the run or typical signs of the chickens being out on an excursion. Cuckoo and Buffy were walking partners for sure, but Bossy pretty much never snuck out. Given body temp and rigor they died in mid afternoon or early evening. We were around and didn’t hear any commotion. Cuckoo laid an egg in the two o’clock hour approximately and it’s been quiet since then. A regular mystery.

Looks like we’ll be getting chicks in the spring…assuming we can figure out what the hell is slaughtering our flock and put an end to it.

With three of the more dominant of the eight now gone the pecking order is sure to be disrupted in the meantime.

Not happy.

Our flock is now seven.

We don’t know what happened. Perhaps dog mauling or a bird of prey or some other predator. I did hear a falcon or hawk calling earlier in the day and looked to see if one was eying the birds but never saw anything. None of us heard any commotion outside of the usual “I laid an egg” announcements during the day. But tonight the Buff Orpington was missing when Jenn went to close up the hen house for the night. After about fifteen minutes of searching I found Buffy in the bushes maybe thirty feet beyond the fence.

She was prone to going on little excursions with the Cuckoo Maran. I’ve had to haul Cuckoo and Buffy in after dark many times, but I’d never found them quite that far afield. At this point each of the birds is clearly unique to us. Buffy stood out from the beginning because she was such the stereotypical little yellow puff ball of a chick. Somehow she was in most of our pictures. She was the second to start laying. She was the only one to use the upper tier of nest boxes, one of which seemed to be exclusively hers, though this past week she’d been laying in “the pasture” and was causing scraped knees trying to get at the eggs she laid behind bushes.

Nevertheless, she had a good 17 months with us and we’ll miss her.