Rockstar

Every evening, I go out to lock the birds up for the night. As we have had coyote and fox sightings in the area this year, I figure the best way to keep our free-ranging chickens as safe as possible is to put them up in the coop early in the evening and not let them out until late morning. That way, during the prime hunting times of dusk and dawn, the chickens won't be available for the taking.

Sometimes, when I walk out to the coop after supper, the chickens see me heading that way, and crowd around me like an entourage. I ignore the fact that they really aren't running alongside me just for food and pretend instead that I am some one very important. They all adore me and are more than willing to fly in front of that bullet if need be.

Other times, the chickens are out of sight. they may be taking refuge in the shade of the deck or bathing in the dust behind the trailer, and don't realize it is feeding (and bed) time. The benefit of not having my entourage is that I can walk without the fear of feathered trip-hazards. Once I am at the coop, I ring the Funny-Farm-Chicken-Dinner-Bell. We keep the scratch in a 20 gallon metal trash can right outside the coop. When I bang the lid on the top of the trash can, it makes a lovely clanging sound. All it take is a clang or two, and the chickens come running from all over the farm. A scoop of scratch through into the run, and the chickens file inside. Then I lock the doors and head back to the house.

There are always a few chickens that don't make it into the big coop at night. Our gray rooster, Slick, knows better than to get into an enclosed space with the big, ruddy alpha-roo. Most nights, Pecker and a black hen or two decide to stick by Slick and roost in the stable. One black hen is currently sitting on a clutch of eggs, so I don't expect her to show. The one chicken I never expect to see is Rockstar.

Rockstar is my one of my favorite chickens. If it weren't for the fact that Isadora has (undeservedly) won my heart with her bouncy, white Afro and screechy brashness, Rockstar would take the cake. Like polar opposites, these two are. You always know when Isadora is near- her voice is like nails on a chalkboard; Rockstar might well be mute for all I know. Isadora boldly roams all over the farm like a queen; Rockstar is a little homebody, never wandering more than 50 feet away from the stable, always sticking close to the house.

And because of that, Rockstar is the last hen I would expect to get nabbed by a predator.

A few nights ago, I had locked the birds up and collected eggs from the big coop. All but Rockstar and the sitting black hen had come that night. And so I walked over to the stable to check the other nesting box for eggs and make sure the black hen and Rockstar were alright. The black hen was settled onto her nest in the stable, but oddly, Rockstar was missing.  She wasn't up in the rafters yet. I didn't see her in the stable pen. I called her name, and went to check under the deck. No Rockstar. I went searching all over, looking in the bushes and around the trailer, and in all the hiding spots I could think of. Not finding her, I circled out into the pastures where I expected to find a clump of feathers, proof of her demise. But there was nothing.

Trudging back to the house as dusk settled in that night, I felt hopeless. "Hang it all," I thought to myself. "If this is how it's going to be, let's just off the rest of them and be done with it." Sometimes it seems we can only take so much heartbreak.

The next morning, I went to the stable to get some fresh water for the sitting hen. Lo and behold, there was Rockstar, looking at me through the stable pen's gate, waiting patiently to be let out. And all was right with the world.