CluckingOnThe45th
Chirping
I have a tendency to start one thing, get halfway through it to only get distracted by another thing. You know how I feel? Start picking up sticks on a trail to use as mulch, but as you're bringing them to your drop point think "I should move that hay bale" and then that snowballs and suddenly you find yourself weeding around a tree 3 acres away from the initial trail and those sticks never got cleaned up. Sound familiar? Well, knowing that about myself I really try to focus on a single thing so I can finish that before moving to the next.
So, that being said I had just put a dozen brats on the grill for the kids' dinner and thought "oh, I should bring the birds water and food and lock them up for the night". See my mistake there? I had one thing going on and instead of just getting that finished I started something else. Well, I fill up buckets and walk out to the run only to find Mr. Possum eating a pile or grits I had dumped in there from the previous day. I said "hey there" and he scurried into the food lean-to. Well, there were no dead birds but I couldn't just le this situation continue and I didn't feel like spending 10 minutes chasing it from this lean-to only to have it go hide under one of the coops.
So I went and grabbed my air rifle and came back to deal with the situation. After that I was tossing it out in a field when the thought "oh crap! The brats!!!!!" popped in my head and I ran back to open the grill and see the damage. They were crispy, but there was enough salvageable parts to make a dinner for everyone with peas or broccoli.
After getting them off the grill and cursing myself a bit I thought "oh, this is a good opportunity to discuss predators and specifically possums with the kids" so I went a grabbed the body and brought it inside for them to see and ask questions about. After the initial "OMG!!! What is that?!?!" there were lots of questions about what they eat, is it a boy or girl, what their teeth and hands look like, where they sleep, ...
So, I got distracted and burnt my brats, but it was for a good reason since who knows if 15 minutes later I would have even known it was in the run. Worst case would have been it ate the grits and hid under a coop after which I would bring food & water and then lock up the run for the night WITH IT IN THERE, but I would have had perfectly grilled brats.
This was the first possum that I've seen on the property in about 2.5 years. All previous chicken deaths have been from owls and we think one coyote.
I had an internal fight about trying to chase it out vs just shooting it but in the end I didn't want to risk it attacking me while I was trying to chase it from that lean-to which is about 3' deep, so in order to use a length of wood you would have to bend down a bit.
So, that being said I had just put a dozen brats on the grill for the kids' dinner and thought "oh, I should bring the birds water and food and lock them up for the night". See my mistake there? I had one thing going on and instead of just getting that finished I started something else. Well, I fill up buckets and walk out to the run only to find Mr. Possum eating a pile or grits I had dumped in there from the previous day. I said "hey there" and he scurried into the food lean-to. Well, there were no dead birds but I couldn't just le this situation continue and I didn't feel like spending 10 minutes chasing it from this lean-to only to have it go hide under one of the coops.
So I went and grabbed my air rifle and came back to deal with the situation. After that I was tossing it out in a field when the thought "oh crap! The brats!!!!!" popped in my head and I ran back to open the grill and see the damage. They were crispy, but there was enough salvageable parts to make a dinner for everyone with peas or broccoli.
After getting them off the grill and cursing myself a bit I thought "oh, this is a good opportunity to discuss predators and specifically possums with the kids" so I went a grabbed the body and brought it inside for them to see and ask questions about. After the initial "OMG!!! What is that?!?!" there were lots of questions about what they eat, is it a boy or girl, what their teeth and hands look like, where they sleep, ...
So, I got distracted and burnt my brats, but it was for a good reason since who knows if 15 minutes later I would have even known it was in the run. Worst case would have been it ate the grits and hid under a coop after which I would bring food & water and then lock up the run for the night WITH IT IN THERE, but I would have had perfectly grilled brats.
This was the first possum that I've seen on the property in about 2.5 years. All previous chicken deaths have been from owls and we think one coyote.
I had an internal fight about trying to chase it out vs just shooting it but in the end I didn't want to risk it attacking me while I was trying to chase it from that lean-to which is about 3' deep, so in order to use a length of wood you would have to bend down a bit.
