This week has been particularly difficult for the girls and I.
Started off rather well. I was planning on canning and preserving. Love doing that. But will get to that later. On a beautiful morning, while preparing fruits for jam, Katie calls me to go to the turkey pen. Not the best timing, but I go.
It was a carnage. Feathers, blood, dead birds…
We don’t know what got in, but whatever it was, it was brutal. There must have been a big struggle with the turkeys before it finally left with one victim. But the damage to the rest of the flock (rafter) was huge.
So now we know what happened to the other 2 turkeys we lost a few weeks ago. Same scenario, just way less loss. We thought the missing turkey had perhaps flown over the fence and been caught, while the dead bird must have been pecked at but the other turkeys. WRONG.
Obviously, the predator (we are thinking a fisher) had gotten in. Well, this time, he killed 2 turkeys, brutalized 3 others and took off with yet another. That’s a grand total of 8 turkeys this thing has taken out.
So Katie and I bagged the 2 dead turkeys. Called Brian to find out the best way to mercy kill 2 birds that were beyond help. First suggestion, grab by the neck and swing over your head to break the neck. NOPE! Second suggestion, place neck on a piece of wood and use an axe to chop. Okay. Not pleasant, but doable. Lots of psyching up in my head. Note to self, keep axe sharpened at all times.
So I swing the axe and nick the poor turkey. It goes crazy and tries to escape. I scream, Katie tries to put it back on the board and I swing again. The axe is just too dull. I end up trying to saw the poor things’ neck. It’s gruesome. There is blood splattering everywhere. Let’s understand that I was not expecting to do this and am wearing pj shorts and flipflops. GROSS. Had to take a major shower!
Katie takes charges of the second killing. Basically, it’s a repeat of my fiasco.
And so it was a bad day. We managed to do the things that needed to be done but I am quite disappointed in my design of the coop. I thought I had dug the fencing low enough underground that no predator could get in. So this is on me.
Now we are screwing in a temporary door on their shelter every night and removing it in the morning. We will make that permanent this weekend.
We knew situations would happen on the farm where we needed to do hard things like mercy killings. We did what needed to be done but I think I could have created a safer environment for the birds. Lesson learned.
I have to say, loosing a pig and 8 turkeys has not been easy. So I make a point of walking around the chickens and admiring their beauty. They are free range all the way and we have found no evidence of daytime predators.
One success story. The pigs are now big enough that the electric fencing works for them. So their enclosure just got way bigger. They both tested the fence within a few moments of it being installed. They squealed, jumped back and learned their lesson. When they realized that they now had lots of lovely grass and flowers to roll in and munch on, they actually jumped around in a merry dance. That was good for my soul.
In a few weeks we will have an addition to our farm family. We found a Great Pyrenese/Maremma cross puppy. It’s a big white fluff ball that will eventually grow to be anywhere between 120 lbs to 160 lbs. He will be our guard dog.
And the cats seem to want to get in the house. Every time I open the door, there’s a cat waiting to get in. Well, one did get in, and as I scooped it up to send it back out, another must have snuck in behind me. A few minutes later I find one settled comfortably on our window seat with Roo! Had to take a picture before sending it packing:)
Unruffled Farms 