Since I would be around pretty much all day on Thursday, I let the chickens out to free roam the property. I have to be home to do this, as the neighbor's dog will take full advantage of my absence to eat them if I am not careful. So I let them out and they had a grand ole time chasing each other around, digging in the flowerbeds and the mulch, scratching and dusting themselves. I went out around 4:30 to get them in before it got dark, called to my chickens and they came running. Tossed some bread into the coop and easy as pie, I closed the gate. And then I counted. There were 7 chickens in the coop. We have 9. Oh. Shit.
I looked in all the window wells, under the porch, in the trees, and found no chickens. I then grabbed a flashlight and really thoroughly checked everywhere they could hide... nothing. So I looked for feathers, fearing the worst. And again, came up with nothing. Not a sign of my two missing hens.
I went back out to where the chicken coop was, and, realizing how close to the woodpile it was, wondered if perhaps a hen had been messing around near it and some wood had fallen off and trapped it (I have pretty awful wood-stacking skills). So I start pulling up the tarp and looking under the logs. I walk around to the other side, and there, low and behold is a fuzzy, red, rhode-island hen's butt sticking out of the wood pile. She wasn't stuck. In fact, it appeared as if she had been digging for bugs, stuck her head under the black tarp, thought that night had fallen, and decided to take a nap then and there. She was happily snoozing until I grabbed her and tossed her back in the chicken coop. My estimation of chicken intelligence level decreased quite greatly in that moment
Well I'm still a chicken down and dark is falling fast. The chicken coop is right next to my shed, and some wildlife had dug under the shed this Summer to whelp their young, so there were some significant gaps on the backside. Before I even laid down on my side and shined my flashlight in, I knew what I would see. Sure enough, I could see a black creature that looked very much like a chicken in the light of my dim flashlight. I went to the other side of the shed and dug out the hole on that side, giving the chicken a forward escape route. I then went inside to grab some bread bait and, lo and behold, there was a chicken standing outside of my coop squawking to be let in. No digging necessary. Just to be sure, I recounted my chickens. And came up with 8.
So I look back under the shed, and sure enough, there is still a creature under it. I bang my boots on the side, trying to scare it out, hollering and calling for it. I peek back under the shed, lying amidst the dirt, wood debris and ashes, and what do I see in a much better view now that it had moved away from the noisy wall, but a rabbit, scared to high heaven at all the noise I was making and very unhappy about it's choice of a resting spot.
Well, I recounted again. I had 9 chickens.
I suppose this is why I'm not a math major.
LOL :)
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