Guess what I woke up to this morning? 

Hubby and my oldest telling me, “All of the chickens are gone.  They’re dead.” 

Wow, what a way to start the day.  Our boys had gone out to feed the chickens and couldn’t believe what they saw when they got to the chicken tractor.  Blood and feathers everywhere.  Their beloved roost was knocked down.  Poor girls were killed during a surprise attack during the night. 

Oh we were mad!!  Those were our laying hens.  Just one year old.  They were just beginning to crank up their egg production for the spring.  We already had people asking if they could buy our fresh eggs.  We loved getting fresh eggs everyday.  We loved our chickens and had tried so hard to keep them safe.

But we messed up last night.  Last night a starving stray dog wandered up.  It was a young lab mix.  We felt sorry for it.  Every bone in its body was showing.  People just don’t realize what they are putting dogs through when they dump them out in the country.  And they don’t realize what trouble it causes for other folks. 

Anyway, we decided to feed the dog and then take it to the animal shelter tomorrow.  WRONG DECISION.  All of you other farm rookies heed our story and learn from our experience.  We should have thought it through better. 

Starving dog + chickens = farmyard massacre

We just didn’t anticipate that dog going after our chickens.  I mean we had given it a bowl of dog food and everything.  UGH!  Sure enough, that dog had torn a hole in the chicken tractor, right at the perfect nose height.  Right by their roost.

So now we’ll spend part of the day getting all of the dead feathers and blood out of our garden area.  The boys will repair the chicken tractor.  And we’ll have to look for someone to sell us some mature laying hens. 

I guess there is a silver lining to every cloud.  We were just getting ready to order a big batch of chicks, so at least we didn’t lose those too.  And we’ve learned a valuable lesson.  Unfortunately now we realize why some farmers consider stray dogs to be such a nuisance.  Living our on this farm kind of forces you to be a little more practical.  Shame on those people for just dumping that dog.  The dog was just trying to survive.  And it killed our chickens in the process!