Timing of things is always important: if you don’t time something that you’re baking, it won’t end well; if you have a sassy comeback to a stupid comment, you usually don’t think of it in time; catching your dog in the act of wrongdoing so that you can scold them properly is always difficult. All these things require proper timing.
Something that didn’t occur to me was timing in regards to our chickens and their chicks practicing their flying skills.
Recently, they have decided that their enclosure is just not good enough, and have been “flying the coop,” so to speak. The coop itself is fully enclosed with a door that we prop open during the day so that they can go in and out and have a bit of yard to explore. That yard area, in turn, is fenced off with a short-ish fence (designed and executed by myself), simply to keep the dog from eating their poop (dogs are gross). Now however, they have learned that they can fly over it. Time to raise the height. Of course our timing is off.
The past weekend, our area was hit with major wind storms. Warmer air, little to no rain but wind that makes you feel like you’re trying to stand on a flatbed truck doing figure eights down the freeway! Okay, maybe not, but the weather reports said gusts up to 60 miles per hour but our home is in a valley between two mountains so the wind gets accelerated when it blows so we always get stronger winds.
We are fairly faithful at letting the chickens out every day. It’s good for them and keeps them happy. So last weekend, we did as we always do and let them out and propped the coop door open. Then went about our business. Twilight falls and it’s time to put them away, so that we avoid another run-in with raccoons. My dear, sweet hubby took pity on me and went out in the wind storm to take care of this, only to come back and tell me that two are missing.
What??? I sigh and launch into action. “I’ll go look,” I say figuring he had somehow just missed them. I know better but, somehow, I feel like things always fall on me to find, even if it’s right in front of someone’s face.
So out I go with a flashlight in one hand and mealworms in another. I’ve already sort of trained them to come when I shake the bag of mealworms. It’s their treat of choice. I wander around the entire yard – all 1.5 acres of it; even inspecting the kid’s playset. Nothing. No evidence of an attack. No feathers. Just “poof!” they’re gone.
We have concluded that they decided to practice flying over the fence to explore the “greener grass on the other side” and got caught in a wind gust. They may have survived and are doing quite well or, they could already have been someone’s meal. We will likely never know.
Now we’re down to three chickens, all because of bad timing.
Bye-Bye Sunlight and Mama Hen.
Adventures with Quirky Kids 