Scarlett

And now we have two chickens, not three.  It has not been a good morning so far.

I went to the coop to let the chickens out this morning, and it was very quiet--- which should have been my first clue that something was wrong in the coop.   I woke up late, so I got to the coop later than usual, and the chickens would normally have been screeching their disappointment at being left in the coop later than seven o'clock.

When I unlocked the gate of the coop, both Audrey and PittyPat were standing there waiting to walk out--- still not a peep out of the them. Very quiet.  I looked into Scarlett's nesting box, where she's been sitting on that fake egg for the last three weeks, and poor Scarlett was on her side, dead in the box. At that point, I wasn't upset...  I thought she had just died in her sleep, which has happened to the hens before.  I left Scarlett where she was because I knew I had to go back to the house for a plastic bag to put her in, but before doing that, I figured I may as well clean up the coop floor.

I picked up the little shovel and dust-pan, and I was bent down towards the floor and that's when I saw the damn snake.... curled up in the basket that was in the corner of the coop.  The chickens liked that basket and would sit in it from time to time.  This morning, that damn snake was in there, curled up and resting, with a huge bulge in his body. Clearly, he had eaten something and then curled up in the basket to digest his meal.

I'm typing this so calmly, but I wasn't calm at the time. I got out of the coop and closed the gate behind me, then got myself back to the house and up the stairs and somehow got the words out to my husband that there was a snake in the coop and Scarlett was dead...  he was out of bed and down the stairs before I had finished two sentences.

My husband went out there with the rifle and shot the snake.  I stayed up on the porch, holding a big black Hefty bag and calling out to my husband to leave the snake in the basket, that I wasn't going to keep that stupid basket anymore and he could just pick up the basket and throw it away with the snake still in it. (I wonder if that would make  good advertising for the Hefty Company?  "Look at this, folks... our bags are strong enough to hold dead snakes that measure four feet long....")

Into the Hefty bag went the basket and the snake.... and then I asked my husband to take Scarlett out of her nesting box and put her in the Hefty bag also.  ("Not only do our Hefty bags hold heavy baskets and dead snakes, but you can toss in a dead chicken and the bag won't break.")  When Scarlett's body was out of the nesting box, that's when we saw that the fake egg was gone. The stupid snake must have killed Scarlett to get to that egg. Even though it was just a fake stone egg to satisfy her broody-stage self, the egg would have taken on Scarlett's odor and the snake wouldn't have known it wasn't real.

I'm guessing that the snake crawled up into the nesting box, Scarlett pecked at him to protect her egg, and then the snake bit her on the neck till she was dead, and then proceeded to swallow that egg.  The snake could have crawled under the gate to get to the nesting boxes, but once the fake egg was inside him, he couldn't have gotten himself back out.  Where to go.... what to do.....  Into the basket he went to digest a stone egg (which wouldn't have been possible anyway and would have killed him eventually if my husband hadn't shot him).

Once again. the hen that was lost was the one who was the friendliest... the most pet-like. Scarlett would let me pick her up and carry her to the coop, and if I didn't remember to do that, she would come out of the coop when she heard me coming to lock the gate and she would plop herself down by my feet so I could pick her up and carry her Royal Henness back to the coop.  She would come up to the kitchen door and just stand there looking in from time to time during the day, as if to remind me that she was out there and needed some attention. And once again, I'm telling my husband No More Chickens. No More Chickens. We'll just buy eggs from the store like everyone else.

So that was the morning....... two quiet chickens who watched from the roosting bar as a snake killed Scarlett and ate a stone egg...... and then me finding the curled-up snake in the basket and somehow getting myself back to the house without screaming all the way from the coop to the back door.  I guess I'm not a screamer...... my throat just closes up and my hands start to shake and I ask myself what in the world are we doing out here in the hills in the first damn place?!