Stupid, stupid, stupid. Up until this point I was such a good chicken Mom, I even saved my Oz from an impacted crop by doing surgery but yesterday I really blew it. I am devastated.
It was such beautiful day I wanted to get the flock outside but the girls kept staying under the corn crib and not coming in at dark, so I was crawling under there to snag chickens. My poor knees and then my 76 yr old mother is under there one evening. Yesterday I tacked up some wire to keep the chickens in the run outside of the corn crib. I was a few feet short - so ah ha I can use the trailer divider (the 3x4 panel metal screen that divides the front) and lean it up against the wall and stabilize it with a 2x8.
As I was grooming my horse for a ride and heard a commotion, looked up and nothing seemed odd. The flock was off to the right and the rooster was harassing a girlie. I looked up again and realized the panel had fallen away from the wall.
OH NO - I ran over imagining-please no, please no don't let an of my girls be under there. I came around the corner and there was my largest black Australorp pinned under the panel, quite obviously deceased and a little SLW looking up at me - like, "Mom get me out of here." The larger bird actually had taken the impact and her body size kept the SLW from being killed. I am thankful I didn't lose two but what an awful thing -it makes me so sad to lose her and to have had a hand in it.
It was such beautiful day I wanted to get the flock outside but the girls kept staying under the corn crib and not coming in at dark, so I was crawling under there to snag chickens. My poor knees and then my 76 yr old mother is under there one evening. Yesterday I tacked up some wire to keep the chickens in the run outside of the corn crib. I was a few feet short - so ah ha I can use the trailer divider (the 3x4 panel metal screen that divides the front) and lean it up against the wall and stabilize it with a 2x8.
As I was grooming my horse for a ride and heard a commotion, looked up and nothing seemed odd. The flock was off to the right and the rooster was harassing a girlie. I looked up again and realized the panel had fallen away from the wall.
OH NO - I ran over imagining-please no, please no don't let an of my girls be under there. I came around the corner and there was my largest black Australorp pinned under the panel, quite obviously deceased and a little SLW looking up at me - like, "Mom get me out of here." The larger bird actually had taken the impact and her body size kept the SLW from being killed. I am thankful I didn't lose two but what an awful thing -it makes me so sad to lose her and to have had a hand in it.
