RIP Xena Chicken
Xena Chicken was killed by a dog this afternoon. >:(
To be very honest, she was my least favorite chicken. She pooed the most and bullied the other chickens, ate lots and only rarely laid an egg. And I ate chicken stew for lunch today, and I'm afraid my relationship with the chickens in the yard has been more as farmer/stock than as owner/pet.
But still, she was our shiny iridescent green/black fluffy little velociraptor and I'm not happy that a dog killed her (and half ate her.) And Meesto really liked her.
I fed the chickens and let them out of their run at noon and left them to free-range all over our yard. They stay in our yard, since our yard is pretty big and filled with bugs and other chicken food (and it was very windy today and in bad weather they stay in the grass right in front of their run gate). I went down at 4pm to feed them corn and put them away. I've been doing this for months with no problems.
When I went down to feed the chickens the afternoon snack and put them away, I couldn't find Xena (which never happens, they flock solid). Meesto came out and helped me look for her and he found her way at the very bottom left corner of our yard. Looking closer we found feathers and it became apparent that she was killed near the gate of the run or possibly even IN the run and then dragged away towards the yard corner and chewed upon by something a lot bigger than a cat. (Xena was a giant Australorp, the size of a small turkey. Cats were scared of her. A cat could not take her. But she was giant and heavy enough that she could not fly away from a dog, which the other birds can.)
There have been no loose dogs in our neighborhood in a very long time. There's one ancient labrador that can't take stairs next door, and some fluffy toy dogs down the block. And then there's the bouncy American staffordshire terriers who live not right below us, but below and diagonal left.
I've not even seen those diagonal-neighbor dogs in a year, ever since the owners built this huge wooden fence to keep them in. However there was this one time a year ago when those dogs escaped out their front yard, entered the front yard of the neighbors directly below us, climbed all the way up the giant hill of the direct-below neighbor's yard, came to the low fence that separates us from the direct-below yard and jumped over it.
So what with Xena getting dragged to the left diagonal corner, the below-diagonal-left dogs seem the most likely culprits.
Meesto called Animal Control and an Animal Control officer was here within half an hour to look at the 'scene of the crime'. And animal Control will make a report which will be sent to the local Dog Ranger, and ...I don't know what happens then. We really have no evidence unless the neighbors stupidly confess that 'yes indeed their dog came home covered in feathers' and if they know the bylaws, they aren't going to do that because dogs that worry/kill any poultry/stock in this town...
...get classified as 'dangerous' and then have to pay higher dog registration fees.
:/
How very anti-climactic.
To be very honest, she was my least favorite chicken. She pooed the most and bullied the other chickens, ate lots and only rarely laid an egg. And I ate chicken stew for lunch today, and I'm afraid my relationship with the chickens in the yard has been more as farmer/stock than as owner/pet.
But still, she was our shiny iridescent green/black fluffy little velociraptor and I'm not happy that a dog killed her (and half ate her.) And Meesto really liked her.
I fed the chickens and let them out of their run at noon and left them to free-range all over our yard. They stay in our yard, since our yard is pretty big and filled with bugs and other chicken food (and it was very windy today and in bad weather they stay in the grass right in front of their run gate). I went down at 4pm to feed them corn and put them away. I've been doing this for months with no problems.
When I went down to feed the chickens the afternoon snack and put them away, I couldn't find Xena (which never happens, they flock solid). Meesto came out and helped me look for her and he found her way at the very bottom left corner of our yard. Looking closer we found feathers and it became apparent that she was killed near the gate of the run or possibly even IN the run and then dragged away towards the yard corner and chewed upon by something a lot bigger than a cat. (Xena was a giant Australorp, the size of a small turkey. Cats were scared of her. A cat could not take her. But she was giant and heavy enough that she could not fly away from a dog, which the other birds can.)
There have been no loose dogs in our neighborhood in a very long time. There's one ancient labrador that can't take stairs next door, and some fluffy toy dogs down the block. And then there's the bouncy American staffordshire terriers who live not right below us, but below and diagonal left.
I've not even seen those diagonal-neighbor dogs in a year, ever since the owners built this huge wooden fence to keep them in. However there was this one time a year ago when those dogs escaped out their front yard, entered the front yard of the neighbors directly below us, climbed all the way up the giant hill of the direct-below neighbor's yard, came to the low fence that separates us from the direct-below yard and jumped over it.
So what with Xena getting dragged to the left diagonal corner, the below-diagonal-left dogs seem the most likely culprits.
Meesto called Animal Control and an Animal Control officer was here within half an hour to look at the 'scene of the crime'. And animal Control will make a report which will be sent to the local Dog Ranger, and ...I don't know what happens then. We really have no evidence unless the neighbors stupidly confess that 'yes indeed their dog came home covered in feathers' and if they know the bylaws, they aren't going to do that because dogs that worry/kill any poultry/stock in this town...
...get classified as 'dangerous' and then have to pay higher dog registration fees.
:/
How very anti-climactic.