Realities of farm life can be disgusting

Sad news this morning. We are one chicken short. (Oh, and some of this post is disgusting – I don’t yet have the stomach for the realities of the farm life, so I thought I’d warn you before you read this.)

We keep the hens and some of the cockerels in a coop next to the house, but most of the boys live in something called a Chicken Tractor. This is a cage made of wire mesh and has a roost on top. The tractor has wheels which allow us to move it twice a day so that the chickens have fresh grass to eat. This has two advantages: one, we can concentrate where the chickens eat (they eat nasty bugs so we put them in the orchard) and poop and second, it keeps them safe from predators – well, safer than free range. Or, at least that’s the plan.

When we opened up the chicken coop this morning, the hens seemed out of sorts. They were making the chattering noise they make after they’ve had a scare. I thought that maybe that little bunny rabbit was around again. The rabbit is half their size but it really seems to bother them.

The chickens in the coop were physically unharmed, though in need of reassurance from us (they get underfoot and demand that we stop and chat with them). The chickens in the tractor, however, didn’t do so well. There was a single chicken leg outside the cage and about half a chicken left inside with his friends. This is even more discussing because when I went to fetch the carcass out, the remaining cocks were upset that I was removing their breakfast. I hate cannibalism – It can lead to nasty illnesses like mad-chicken. Okay, on a small scale production like ours, it’s not that serious – but it is a health risk I would rather they had not taken. Besides, it makes a huge mess and I worry it will encourage them to peck on each other and before last night, that bunch has been getting along very well with no injuries.

My worries were quickly confirmed. One chicken from the tractor is injured and of course the other boys are all picking on him. So he goes in the chicken hospital (a small cage with some water and food) which we place near to his friends so that they can stay socialized as he recovers.

What happened last night, as far as we can tell, is that a small creature, possibly a mink, dug under the cage and up through the bottom wire (which has larger holes than along the side). It ate a chicken’s head then tried to drag off a leg for a later snack. yuck! It must have hurt the other poor chap in the process. We made the tractor according to what we’ve read in books, magazines and the internet. Obviously, we were under cautious. We were very lucky to loose only one chicken last night and today, well, we are upgrading the chicken tractor. I might stay up late and keep vigil tonight. I don’t sleep much these days anyway and judging from the smell and that the corps was stiff, I think it might have happened early in the evening.

On a side note, we were going to have roast chicken for dinner tonight, but given the smell of decomp. and all that blood, I might have a vegan meal for once. I’ll have to see how I feel closer to dinnertime.