It happened again tonight.
Darkness falls earlier and earlier and we aren’t always RIGHT there to make sure the chickens have all tucked themselves into bed. And sometimes it even happens when there is still light in the sky, and dusk is more than an hour away.
Winter around these parts means earlier bedtimes, and later mornings. At 4pm we are ready to eat dinner and curl up with a movie, when only 2 short months ago we were still at the beach, sucking the remaining rays out of summer.
As much as we humans are on a winter schedule, so are the flock.
They start roosting around 330pm. The hens at the bottom of the pack attempting to find a good spot before the bullies come in and start pushing them around.
Our main man, the Rooster, finds a perch about 415pm, ensuring that his “important hens” are in and safe for the night.
Except for a few wild ones. These gals find a spot in the trees around 3pm, about 10ft up and just out of reach of my “big stick” It is mostly our older breeds of hens- the White Faced Black Spanish being the absolute WORST for it and the source for the majority of my chicken stress.
If we go down to the chickens at dusk there is no way of seeing them, but if it is early enough I can usually shake them out. If I miss them at evenings count I worry.
Worry as I would about anything defenceless out late at night. I open my window a crack on these nights, waiting to hear the sound of a predator attacking it’s prey (my hen) possibly thinking I can stuff my feet into my slippers fast enough to storm out there with a flashlight and chunk of firewood. Ready to beat it off in defence of my girl.
So far we have been lucky. There has been many a night with a hen that failed to come home to roost in the day, but each morning they show up, a little chilled but none worse for the wear.
As the winters nights get earlier, my “chickens to bed” routine gets earlier as well, all in the hopes I can catch my rowdy girls and force them into safe confinement for another night.
And another, and another.