Fox in the Hen House!

Sunday morning started the same as every morning around here. Everything seemed quite normal. It was raining, again, or should I say still, but other than that everything was quiet. I had just finished milking and was finally having my tea and breakfast. Mountain Man was fast asleep. He has been working rather hard lately and he needed a bit of a lie in this morning. Not that it was very late but rather I get up fairly early to milk. I love those quiet mornings.

So, there I was relaxing with my tea when all of a sudden there was a terrible racket outside and I quickly looked out the window. A fox was in the chicken run and had one of my girls in his mouth!!! He was trying to jump the fence with her but the rooster was attacking him so ferociously and the hen fighting so hard he couldn't get over the fence. It only took a half second to realize what was going on and I yelled (OK, I screamed) at Mountain Man, "A fox has a hen!" and ran out of the house. 

Didn't stop for shoes, didn't stop at all, just ran as fast as my legs would carry me towards the run. By the time I was halfway there yelling my fool head off for all I could the fox had dropped the hen, scaled the fence and was bounding away. 

Then I saw him, out of the corner of my vision a streak ran straight for the fox. It was Mountain Man. Butt naked with gun in hand running for all he was worth through the mud and grasses to try to get a shot at the fox. The grassy fields are thigh high now so it was almost impossible to see where the fox was but the gun came up and "boom!" Sadly we didn't get the fox, but the sight of Mountain Man running to the rescue will be burned in my mind forever. My hero!! Its a good thing we live in the middle of nowhere of the neighbors sure would have gotten an eyeful!!

As for the chicken? She is still alive but in pretty bad shape. The skin is puncture badly on her back and she can't walk very well. She also as most of her feathers missing on her breast and left leg, but she is alive. I carefully put her in a quiet place in the barn where she won't be disturbed and hopefully she will heal. This morning she slowly made her way to the water and feed and was eating while I milked so I'm hopeful that she will be OK, unless an infection sets in.

Our brave rooster is mostly unhurt and much more alert now. He did lose a few feathers but otherwise is none the worse for the experience.

I'm not sure when or if the fox will be back but I am every conscious of the need to secure the chicken run. The cost is prohibitive but surely we can come up with something soon. Meantime my glance is constantly going to the run and I am hesitant to let them out for more than an hour at a time.

Also linked in to The Morris Tribe and The Prairie Homestead blog hops.

The Fox

This weekend we saw another of our favorite creatures. A beautiful red fox. It was so funny to watch him hunting for mice. He would cock his head this way and that way and if he heard one he would jump straight up into the air, probably about 2.5 feet and pounce. I couldn't tell if he caught anything but I sure hope so as we have no shortage of mice around here.

I have such a love/hate relationship with foxes. The are just such beautiful creatures and always appear to have such intelligence and yet they are well known for decimating chicken coops. He was a little too close to the house for us to go out and take pictures as he is quite skittish but we both loved watching him. Which reminded me of a little fox we found while moving a shed from the north quarter.

Mountain Man chose one nice summer day a few years ago to bring one of the decent sheds from the north quarter to our yard site as we just had too many building tools and he needed someplace to store them as most of the building was done and the tools needed to leave the house.

I was working on something around the yard, although now I can't remember what, when he drove up in the truck. Hmm...  What went wrong now? Where was the shed? He had a barrel with him which I thought was very strange until he reached in and grabbed this little fellow for me to see. What a cutie! Apparently when he had dragged the shed off its spot this little guy was underneath it and didn't know where to go. Nice guy that he is he really wanted me to see it so brought it home. Can we all say a collective Awwww!  I know I did! Although, looking at him I wondered if he would grow up to be a chicken hunter.  There was nothing for it however, he was no danger to the chickens at his age and I couldn't put him down just because he might end up being one. So, back he went underneath another shed for his mother to find.

For all I know that is him out there right now hunting mice and I am glad to have him here. If in some distant future he becomes a danger to our chickens we will deal with it. But for now we are content to watch him from a distance and enjoy his beauty.