How is it that we are loosing hens? STILL! For the past several weeks, Ella comes back from feeding the hens in the morning to report “There’s another one down.” And by ‘down’ she means completely annihilated. They are very dead.
This is the part of caring for these gentle animals that I will never get used to. So out I trod, to dispatch of the VERY dead hen and to, yet again, inspect the fencing to see where the infiltration of the unknown predator is occurring. Handsome Rob (our rooster gifted to us by Caitlin at Appleton Creamery) is doing an admirable job of herding the hens and they are all crowded together behind him as he does his utmost best to be big and threatening.
On one auspicious day I just happened to notice a hawk perched on the pine tree. Right. Above. The hen house. Ah ha!
But I have garden tape strung from one side to the other… How can this be? And then I see in the snow the sweep of wingtips that are decidedly un-chicken like and my hunch is confirmed. A hawk is getting into the hen yard.
So I string more tape and when those are broken along with another hen, I add baling twine. A lot of it.
Silence… Peace… Happy hens… Whew!
Annie
A good hen mama
3 Comments
cindy fullerton
April 23, 2013 at 1:48 pmoh my, our sympathy. Do not like to see critters taken.
Marcia O'Neil
June 8, 2013 at 9:35 pmHave tried to e-mail you to no avail. I have received a particularly nasty e-mail from Artichokes and Asparagus, no mention of At Home and At Sea. I am assuming that someone accessed your system. Has anyone else mentioned this to you? Thought you might like to know. Marcia, ex-Maine, now Montana
Maine – A Place to Stop and Smell the Sea Air « At Home And At Sea
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