No More Chickens - The Not So Short Version

2 months ago we had 16 chickens. We've lost a couple to hawks. We lost 3 to a coyote. Then we started losing chickens for we didn't know what.

I think it was last week that we lost 3 in one night. I was letting the dogs out the next night a little after dusk. I heard an incredibly awful chicken scream. Have you ever heard a chicken scream? It was awful. It was one of the worst noises I've ever heard. It was loud. It was high pitched. And it was loud. And yes, I do know I just wrote that twice. It was that loud.

So being the really smart person that I am, I ran to the chicken coop where the chicken screaming was coming from. I ran there without a flashlight. Without a weapon of any kind. Without thought, obviously. I did take Sally the Skunk dog with me though. Realizing that I had no weapon and that was an idiot for going to the screaming chicken coop without a weapon I did the best I could think of and started kicking and banging on the door. And then the chicken screamed again. And something ran out of the side of the coop. At least I think it did. I heard it run into the wall on the side of the coop. Sally heard it too. She ran towards the house. It took WAY less than a second for me to run too. Wouldn't you run too? The big ol' 1/2 lab dog that isn't afraid to take on a skunk R A N away. I ran too.

Hubby had stopped at a friends house on the way home. I called him about as fast as I ran back to the house. I'm not sure exactly what I said but he got the point and was home fast enough that I'm pretty sure he broke a couple of speeding kind of rules. While he was on his way I found a flashlight and something that could be used for a weapon. Neither of which I needed. He drove the truck to the backyard and pointed the headlights at the coop. Way better idea than my $3.49 flashlight.

The headlights revealed a raccoon trying to get into the coop. Jim yelled and screamed at it. Threw something at it. Coon ran. Jim went around to the front and replayed my pounding on the door thing, minus the running to the house part. Nothing else ran out. He took the truck back to the driveway. I tried to tell him what had happened. I don't think he heard me. He went out the garage. And then to the basement. And the whole time he was yelling about chickens and #$%& raccoons. I tried to tell him about the chicken screaming. He told me he had a plan and went back outside. He was out there for a while before I went out to see what the plan was.

Hubby was on the porch. Sitting on one of the porch chairs. Flood light flashlight on the table. .22 Pellet gun in his right hand. Left hand holding a Budweiser. Does this make us rednecks again?

We never did get any of the raccoons. We reinforced the chicken coop. The next night they got another chicken. We reinforced the chicken coop again. Then they got 2 more chickens. More reinforcing. More chicken slaughtering. Do you see where this is going?

Last night we had 3 chickens left. This morning we had none. I cried. There are no more chickens.

**big sigh**