Stories in Snow

Some people can read stories in the snow. For those who knew where to look our first snowfall of the year told a story. And, like any good story it starts with a villain.

The fox came out of the trees trotting toward the chicken coop.

Bold as brass he jumped right on the chickens front porch. There he did what foxes do at chicken coops.

And the trail of feathers told the tail.

Just around an apple tree the fox tracks are joined by another set as our hero joins the chase.

The tracks lengthen as the dog runs off after him. And what is this following behind?

Why it looks like the track of a crazed woman, owner of both dog and chicken who is tired of her birds being used as a fox buffet and willing to fly through a snowfall barefoot with her dogs to stop it.

Sadly. Our tale is a tragic one for the chicken as the fox disappeared through the snow, prize in mouth, despite our hero’s best efforts.

The snows have continued coming since the story began and on each fresh white page the story goes on, another lost chicken, a run in with the turkey that the fox lost and who knows, maybe one day the story will have a happy ending…

… from the chickens point of view.

Chicken in the Shower

Don’t you just hate it when you quick go to jump in the shower and you forget about your chicken?

Me too…

This chicken (recently named Foxy) was rescued from a fox by yours truly and has been recuperating in our shower.  The shower, unfortunately for the rest of my family, is my new favorite injured bird holding area.

But I digress, you don’t want to hear the details of why the chicken moved out of a dog crate into the far superior shower, you want to hear about the fox attack. Right?

Right.

The moment the fox attacked is exactly why I acquired geese and they finally had their opportunity to shine and show off their watch-goose capabilities. Which they mostly did! The two of them set off an unholy racket, were joined by the ducks’ alarming quacks and then the rooster’s panic call. By the time I got to the gate and into the orchard, chickens were squirting out from under apple trees in every direction, the ducks were huddled and quacking and the gander was begging me to open the gate and let him into the yard where it was safe. Apparently, while he’s very good a sounding an alarm, he’s not actually very brave.

Running upstream through fleeing poultry I found a fox with one of my chickens in it’s mouth. I was able to convince the fox to drop my chicken and leave but it took a considerable amount more yelling and running and arm waving and clapping on my part than I felt it should have. Cheeky little bugger just looked at me, dropped the chicken, bounded off, then came right back and grabbed her again before finally dropping the bird and leaving for good. Apparently I need to work on my “I’m big and scary let go of my chicken!” look.

But, despite a complete lack of tail, and some nasty puncture wounds, Foxy The Chicken is doing well (Due in large part to the help of a friend who watched her when I left on vacation the next day) and is just about ready to rejoin the rest of the flock.

I’ll miss her friendly chatter as she roams the bathroom while I shower but I gotta tell ya, chicken feed (and other matter) really scatters when it hits a tile floor!

Reinforcing Bad Habits

One morning I (after, of course, staying up far too late the night before) woke up, completed the mostly unpleasant task of getting two of the girls to school, put breakfast in front of the crying and volatile third and went out to take care of morning chores.

My dog (always watching out for me because he’s, you know, perfect) alerted me to the presence of an intruder underneath the brooder house.fox under the chicken coop

I pondered the situation, took a picture (who am I kidding, I took five, then my camera battery died), showed Jane what a fox looks like (he was much further away than he appears in the picture) and then made a decision.

The chickens stayed locked up, the dogs were put in the basement and Jane and I went back to bed.

When I woke up, the fox was gone and the rest our daytime visitors were cheery-looking (okay, so the bluebird looks grumpy but I’m pretty sure he was actually super happy) winged creatures.

Today was probably terrible reinforcement of my napping and avoidance habits, not to mention my problem with procrastination…

But hey! I had a great day- the second go around!