A Sad Sunday, July 20, 2014

April 7th, I had total knee replacement surgery. It's a bummer recovery and I wasn't able to visit the girls for about 5 weeks until I was sure the stitches had closed up - not wanting any yucky microbes entering my body.

Steve did a great job with Chicken Duty; in fact, they lost weight because they weren't getting the treats from Auntie Karla!

So, Sunday afternoon he went down to close them inside the coop-pen. Four of the Girls were waiting by the main door, but no Evie.

A pretty Evie, Buff Lace Wyandotte

He looked around the back of the coop and found her...dead.
No apparent trauma, just crumpled on the ground.
She was great in the morning when I went down to let them into the pastures, but a little pale on the comb and wattles.
No signs of impacted egg, a killer of chickens; but she hadn't laid an egg for a week. Some feather loss around her rear and very hard to notice because she was so fluffy: could have been mites but they generally aren't killers. Maybe heart issues or massive worms, but I hadn't noticed worms in poo. Maybe just 'her time'.

Such a pretty girl, sweet and shy. She was just above the bottom girl Amelia on the pecking order and seemed to just "take it" from Fearless whenever mean Fearless wanted to get her away from food. She did love pecking greens and corn out of the suet boxes when I would fill them and never shied away from a secret offering of worms, but not really comfortable eating out of my hand.

Chicken Mentor Barb gave me Evie as the replacement to Blondie, who was a meal for the local hawk. I have appreciated having her for these 19 months.

She was a Buff Lace Wyandotte; I would definitely get another one for their beauty and sweet temperment...

Waiting on more new chickens until the knee is functioning better and we get a handle on the sciatica-related issue.

Back to blogging more....stay tuned!