The Day the Chickens Died

I drove home two weeks ago, excited to see Andy as he'd just started his new job. I drove past our house (as one must do before turning into the drive), and I see Andy standing in the yard near the chicken coop, looking at me with hands held as a warning, as if perhaps I should just stop there and stay there. I drove slowly past where he stood, near the chicken coop, and although I couldn't see much, I could clearly see that the bodies in the chicken yard aren't moving.
My heart stopped.
I parked, got out of the car, and walked into the chicken yard with him. It was one of the most horrifying things I'd ever seen--chickens all dead, two roosters barely breathing, and a stunned, paralyzed turkey. (The ducks were fine, though, just waddling around happily. We will never understand this.)
We had no idea what had happened--Mason was tied up (no, this is not our first choice of dog treatment but he cannot be contained as he hurts himself trying to escape and the invisible fence--which worked beautifully for a while--was shorting out and he was constantly loose). We were just stunned.
At one point in our silence among the carnage, Andy choked out, "Maybe the ducks did it."
It was welcome laughter.
It didn't take long before we heard the story--our wonderful neighbor (an older man whose family lives near us and he takes care of cattle next door) had driven by and seen Mason in the coop, so he intervened and tied him back up. So by the time we got home, Mason was contained and snuggling with a dead chicken. (He'd managed to burrow under a tiny spot under the fence after he slipped off his collar. We never said we were good at this stuff.)

Before we found out about Mason, I was stunned and sad, but when we found out it was him I just broke down. He's been such a difficult dog since we adopted him last winter, and now this? I called our rescue, I called other rescues, I called the vet, and I called a trainer. We got conflicting advice, but have decided to Fort Knox the invisible fence, electrify the chicken pen, and hire a trainer for an afternoon for the outside dogs. None of this is ideal, since we know his prey drive is set, it's instinct, but we think it's the best solution. If we didn't keep him, he didn't have much of a future. (And unfortunately, we learned of the old wives' tales about "fixing" the problem with a dead chicken after the fact.)

As for our poultry... we had raised them from chicks, so it was hard to see so much work and time be erased in a few minutes' of "Look at me play, mom and dad!" Our Ameraucanas had just started laying (we had 13 eggs--we still do, I'm planning something special for them), and the Barred Rocks hadn't even started. Turkey's fate was not to be a long-time pet, but he was getting so big and, dare I say meaty? I had to finish off one rooster, but our survivors were the ducks, Buster and Lucille, and Gob the rooster (he's still healing).
We drove to Silex the weekend after it happened, as they were hosting a twice-yearly poultry festival. We came home with three sex-link (Barred Rock and Rhode Island Red cross) hens, three white Cochins (one rooster, he came with the set), and two Buff Orphingtons who are already laying (the others are about five months old). They're living happily in the coop now, as we fix the fencing systems so this doesn't happen again.

We bought most of the new birds from an Amish man. We told him the story, and he said he'd had to shoot a dog who took out about 40 of his birds. He said that these things happen to people who are trying to keep livestock, and they will either quit, or persevere. "If you're going to share something," he said, "you have to be willing to lose it."

We're not going to stop. Even when we should stop, many times we don't. We might be trying to do the impossible again by wanting everyone to live together outside, but we can't not try again.

For now, those 13 little blue eggs will go untouched in the refrigerator, until we can share them and appreciate them fully. Because that's what this is all about.