Good morning, all! Don't you just LOVE this weather now? Makes doing the chicken chores so much more pleasant!
My chickens are enjoying the broken pumpkins I bring home from my church's pumpkin patch. I crack a couple open with a shovel every morning and set them out for them to peck.
I'm sorry for the lost silkie, Murphy's Law of Chicken Depredation says that it's ALWAYS your favorite bird that gets taken first. With chickens, you live & you learn & often you learn the hard way. But sometimes, there's just nothing you could have done to prevent their loss unless you bring them all indoors to live with you there. Even then, some of them would still hurt themselves slipping in the shower or have an accident while they're cooking in the kitchen.
You'll know what to do with your own child, if he'll do better being told the chicken drowned or some more pleasant story. My boys have had to learn the sad realities of caring for chickens, that none of them live forever, but they were a bit older when they started. We take comfort in burying our favorites right at the drip line of fruit trees or flowering shrubs. There they help contribute to the growth of the plant, and in that way, continue to live. My favorite broody hens are buried around my little peach tree. When the little fuzzy peaches come out, it seems that the hens are still helping little fuzzy babies to grow.