Today one of our chickens had an....er....um....accident. Ok so to be honest, it was actually one of our dogs that caused her "accident". See, we have a mini Aussie that seems to be having some mental stability issues. Like for instance, she likes rocks. Yep, kinda crazy. You can't even bend down to pick up something off the ground without her freaking out and trying to attack your hand. She thinks you are picking up a rock to throw it for her. Try pulling weeds around here....doesn't go so well when she's around. Snow shoveling is pretty much in that same category. She also tends to go off the deep end if she sees those little spots of reflected light dancing around the room.....you know, like something that one of those laser pointers, or even a flashlight, would make.
Here's a couple of pics to illustrate my point:
Does she actually think she's gonna be able to fit this one in her mouth?
Will she have any teeth left one day?
Here she is standing at our front door waiting for someone to open it so she can sneek in with her rock.
Guess the common denominator here is the fact that she lives for the chase! So, add that to the fact that we have a flock of chickens in our backyard.....this tends to cause problems every so often. We have a very large fenced in area for the chickens but sometimes we have an AWOL chicken or two.
Back to the story....yes, I'm getting to the duct tape part......
So I get home from the store and as we are carrying the groceries in, the dogs get out. I don't think too much of it because I knew that they probably had to go out and do "their business". BUT I forgot that they were out there since I went right to the task of putting the groceries away. Well....
I heard a very faint squawking coming from the backyard and I immediately knew what was going on! I ran out there, and all the way on the other side of the chicken pen I see Mocha joyfully ripping the feathers off the neck of a chicken that she had cornered and pinned down. I ran all the way across the yard, scaled the heights of an old futon mattress that we had stood along side of the chicken coop (we are disposing of it and didn't want it in the house for our last house showing), hurdled one of our old garbage cans, braved the blackberry bushes at the back of the coop, and did an "almost" army crawl for 10 feet. I arrived at the scene of the crime and Mocha just backed up a bit and stared at me, with a look that seemed to say "this was great fun". The poor chicken lay there looking half dead. I carefully picked her up and accessed the damage. She had some missing feathers--obviously--since I saw them flying up in the air not just a minute ago. AND as I looked closer I found that she had a cut in her skin from the top her head all the way down to the bottom of her neck! It kinda reminded me of the chicken you buy at the store....you could see all of her muscles and her skin seemed to be sliding right off her neck! UGH....can I just say "NOT pretty?!"
So. I think to myself. What to do about a chicken who's whole entire neck bone and scull could just... pop out ....at .....any ......second! YES! You think like MacGyver! DUCT TAPE to the rescue! Soooo, here's how you can save a chicken's life with duct tape....just in case you ever need to know:
See? All better. No stitches necessary! =)
I just gathered up all of her feathers on the sides of the cut and made a pony tail out of them, then I just duct taped them together! Thanks MacGyver!
Here's to animals for filling our lives full of a perfect balance between entertainment and disaster!
Wendy
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