quineas are loud and not the prettiest of birds. And over the years I've lost at least a dozen to the road. oh well.
I have a chesapeak bay retiever and a black labish mutt both about 70lb.s each. I've lost a few chickens to the dogs. A couple of years ago the chessie, Honey got loose and caught one of my roo's. Now this roo would sleep 30 ft up a tree at nite but when a dog chases them they only run. Anyway I'm trying catch hold of honey and we play dodge rooster for about 20 minutes. Honey would stop drop the roo and wait for me to catch up then pick up the roo and take off again. I lose site of her around the house and then see her tail wagging from under a bush. I grab the base of her tail and her collar and pull her out of the bush and tie her off to a tree before I go to see whats left of the roo. As I look under the shrub I see .... nothing. Looking around for the rooster I check all surrounding bushes and shrubs. Nothing. I'm at a loss and go back to bush where I first looked and took one last look. Nothing..wait I see movement...Two feet sticking up out of the dirt. Honey had buried the rooster alive. I pulled him up and out by his feet. He's a muddy mess and then makes a warbliy croking sound. In the mean time Honey's jumping up and down and barking, wanting to play dodge chicken again. I put the rooster in a small cage with food and water and hope for the best. Three days later he's fit n fine and can't wait to get out of the cage.
I love to have a ratter. I do have feral cats around but they dont seem to affect the rat/ rodent problem. But they are afraid of the chickens.
As for staying awake...its 3:30 am sun.and time for dinner. Have a great week