I have a young hen that has decided she would rather be in the smaller chicken house with the 10 week old chickens than with the adult birds. We can't figure out how she is getting there but every time I put her back, she is there again the next day. There is a high (6 ft) shelf in there that I keep lights, feeders, etc. on and a big cardboard box got put up there that the ducks came in. She has started laying in that. So yesterday I went out to check something and decided to check for eggs while I was out there. I noticed something in the box that didn't look like an egg and the hen was in the run. I backed up until I could see it better and it was a SNAKE!!! I went to the house and got my trusty 22 rifle and came back and held it over my head to put a few rounds into said snake. It started crawling out along the shelf so I grabbed a hoe from the garden and pulled it off the shelf and finished it off. It was a 5-1/2 foot chicken snake! I am never again putting my hands in dark spaces without looking first. ( I know these aren't venomous but from all accounts their bites usually cause a nasty infection. ) So everyone remember that it is that time of year and the snakes are crawling!
