dog days of summer

Yesterday was not a good day. To start off it was 90 degrees with a
relative humidity of 70%. I had to get up early to drive to the fairgrounds
and help break down the Master Gardener exhibit, load my car with some very
heavy stuff and drive home and unload. Then after doing a bit of housework
I went into my office to write and my husband went to take his afternoon
nap.

Now had we been a little smarter what happened next wouldn't have happened.
In the last few days I kept remarking to my husband on how dirty some of the
dogs were, I asked them if they were digging holes to keep cool, I even
remarked to my husband that they were probably up to something. Jack
Russell's are usually up to something. But it was hot and we were busy
during fair week and neither of us pursued the matter. Besides, we hadn't
had any breakouts for over a year, since we installed hot wire on the top
and bottom of the backyard fence.

Well three of my darling little Jacks had discovered that they could dig
near the bottom of the fence in the corner by where the dog door from the
house exits. There was a short stretch where we left out hotwire so our
older dogs coming and going from the house wouldn't get shocked. Our
garbage bin was on the other side of the fence there and we had laid down
some aluminum panels on the dog's side of the fence. Seemed pretty secure
and so it was for about 15 months. Then some how the panel got shifted and
the dogs began their tunnel to freedom.

We figure it took them about three days. That's when I noticed how dirty
they seemed to be. They had to dig a tunnel under the fence then under the
trash bin on the other side. They are nothing but ambitious even in the
sweltering heat. Although I walked by that stretch regularly on my way to
the barn all the clandestine activity was hidden behind the trash bin. Then
as my husband and the big dogs lay down for their nap and I disappeared into
my office the great escape began.

I heard some excited barking but that's not unusual here. Suddenly it
dawned on me the barking seemed a little more excited than usual and farther
away. I hurried outside and realized the barking was coming from the barn
and my heart sank.

Inside the barn and inside the chicken coop- standing on top of the nest
boxes- was Susan, Ginger and Tina. They were barking at a hen who had
managed to fly up to the ledge by the loft rafters. The pen where my
banties had been was torn apart and the dead birds strewn across it. On the
coop floor below them were the bodies of my dead and dying hens. Feathers
and blood were everywhere.

I didn't have much trouble catching the culprits. They were pretty hot and
exhausted. I could only carry two of them but Tina was content to follow us
back to the house. There, after I threw them into the spare room I screamed
and yelled at them for a few seconds, and at my husband to get out of bed.

I brought a big muck bucket with me to the barn and began picking up dead
bodies. Besides the hen that flew up into the rafters another had flown up
onto the highest perch and was safe. Had more of the birds went up high
they would have been safe. Instead they piled under the nest boxes, which
begin about a foot from the floor. There they were pretty easy pickings,
but the sheer number of them managed to protect a few of them, who were
still alive when I began pulling out bodies. I placed the injured birds in
nest boxes to calm down and offered them water about 30 minutes later.

When my husband came out he found one hen outside in the yard which seemed
unharmed. I still can't find one of the tiny banty hens - she may be
hiding somewhere. Our resident roaming turkeys and frizzle rooster were
also unharmed. All in all 10 birds were killed, 9 birds are left, and some
of them have some nasty wounds and may die. One bird is missing.

Our egg production was just getting good. I had actually sold off some hens
because I figured we didn't need them. I just sat down and cried. Such a
waste. I don't know how the dogs got inside the coop- we figure they
squeezed through the door at the bottom.

The dogs were punished by being left locked in the spare room with only
water until we went to bed. They hate being away from the pack. I went to
bed scheming about ways to really punish them, like hiring strangers dressed
in giant chicken suits to chase them around or strapping them to a board on
their sides with vet wrap and putting them in a chicken coop full of hungry
chickens.

Don't worry- none of that happened. We spent the morning filling in a
tunnel, strengthening the coop door and burying chickens. And Tina,
Ginger and Susan are being watched more closely than ever.