Well, I had the week from hell this past week. Sunday, I go outside and find a trail of duck feathers leading from my yard across to what used to be my grandma's yard, across that and across the road over to my awful neighbor's place. All ducks were accounted for, but most of my ten three month old chicks are missing.
Monday, I find my silkie hen with her neck torn wide open, still alive. I take her to my workshop and try to make her as comfortable as possible, thinking she will pass away. I doctor up the wound and give her aspirin for pain.
Tuesday I had to leave for work at 7 in the morning so I rolled out of bed, got ready, and left without checking the chickens, whom I had left penned because of the attacks. I get to work, go about my business, and my mom comes in to work (we work at the same place right now) a little while later. On my lunch break, I stop by. She tells me that my father had gone outside earlier that morning, and all the birds had somehow, with the exception of Lacie (my little goose) and one barred rock hen, gotten out of the run. And as he was walking over to the workshop, he spotted my Rhode island red hen laying on the ground, as well as one of the wyandottes that Bakingintherain gave me.
He walks over, thinking they're dead, and the Rhode island red jumps up when he touches her and bolts into the woods. He goes over to the wyandotte and flips her over and she staggers to her feet and totters away. So, angry, he walks over to the neighbors, who are out in the yard, and talks to them. They at first try to say they think it's another dog from up the road, and then their hell hound shows up with feathers from my birds in its mouth. Well, no arguing with that. As it turns out, it's a new dog their daughter had got (because they already have like ten and she really needed one more, and a pitbull of course, because they needed another of those to raise poorly) and they apologize and the wife offers my dad some more chickens, which they have a ton of and do not feed (at which point my dad explains it's not that I want more chickens, it's that my chickens are pets and their dog is killing my pets just as surely as if it had killed someone's cats). They promise to tie it up.
I come home, look in the backyard, and there's the dog, standing over a pile of feathers. What looks like a tiny piece of rope is dangling from his collar, so maybe they did tie him up with rope and he snapped it, or maybe they didn't, who knows, but here he is in my yard again. Feathers are everywhere. I chase him off. I can't find a single bird except Lacie safe in her pen and the one barred rock. I go looking in the woods way to the other side of my property, I find Honey (my buff orp roo) and four girls, and I bring them back and feed them and lock them in the pen. Luckily one of the four is my favorite hen, so at least she's safe.
At this point I'm devastated. I'm wandering around the yard in the rain carrying my blue food scoop hoping the other birds are around and they'll see it and come thinking I have food. Suddenly I hear a rooster crowing up the road and it sounds like Lime (my other roo) and I go walking up the road carrying my little scoop at the same time my dad is driving back from the workshop. He sees me (he also saw the dog as I chased it home so he sort of knows what's going on) and asks what I'm doing. I say something to the effect of that there are feathers from almost every bird I own all over the yard and I can only find five and I think I hear Lime up the road but I started crying in the middle of it so I don't know if it made much sense. I kept going up the road and suddenly Lime burst out of the woods on one side and came running over to me. I can't tell you how happy I was to see that rooster. His feathers had been all over the yard and I was sure the dog had killed him while he tried to protect the girls.
He usually hates being held but for some reason he let me pick him up and start carrying him down the road. My dad was walking up the road toward me and I must have looked pitiful clutching a rooster to my chest in the pouring rain trying not to cry. Even though he usually doesn't care much about the chickens he started helping me look in a rainstorm, so I'm sure I looked awful.
On our way down the road Lime suddenly started clucking and three more hens came running out of the woods to him. I set him down and he followed me and told his girls to follow and they did. So I got them in the pen and we kept looking. After a while in the rain my dad gave up and said we'd have to wait till night and see if any more came back.
I wasn't ready to give up just yet and kept looking and I did manage to find one, my Rhode island red, standing dazed on the porch of what used to be my grandma's house, right across the road to where the dog lives. I carried her back and put her in the pen. Those were all the birds I found.
The next morning, thank goodness, I found four more waiting for me outside the pen to let them back in. My new black copper marans hen, Plum, Penny the buff orp, and the wyandotte whom had been so badly attacked. All appear to be okay except missing feathers. Two of my babies from this year have also shown back up. Just two, out of all the ones I had. All the other hens and chicks are still missing.
Wednesday, some chicks I had ordered to replace the ones that were killed arrived. All dead. The silkie, Fluff, was also still alive. She was one of my first hens and I was very attached to her so I finally took her to the vet. They told me the wound was too extensive to heal even if they stitched it up (the tissue underneath had dried out and the flesh around the outside was dying) so I had to have her put down.
Thursday, I was late to work because on the way I was run off the highway by a drunk driver and had to spend two hours talking to the police.
Friday, thank goodness, I had the day off, but it rained all day and all Saturday as well so I got no work done on my new coop and run.
So anyway, that was my week, sigh. Here's hoping this week will be better. Sorry to write a small novel, I just wanted to vent and I knew you guys more than anyone else would understand why my week was so awful. No 'they're just chickens' here!
I haven't seen that dog again since it was over here that day, but I have vowed that if I catch it on my property again, it's not going to make it home. I don't have a gun, but it'll either make a trip to the vet or to someone who does...
